Category: Ben Gazzara

ANATOMY OF A MURDER

By Marc S. Sanders

I’m a sucker for courtroom theatrics and Otto Preminger’s Anatomy Of A Murder is no exception.  Though it is sorely out of date when most of today’s viewing audiences have at least one Law & Order episode under their belt. Preminger’s film, adapted from the novel by Robert Traver and inspired by a real-life upstate Michigan homicide, hinged on taboo language and heinous motives enabled by revenge.  Even the father of leading man, James Stewart, found this film to be entirely offensive and campaigned for audiences to avoid seeing it.

Army Lieutenant Frederick Manion (Ben Gazarra) is on trial for the murder of an innkeeper he believed raped and abused his promiscuous wife, Laura (Lee Remick).  Good ol’ boy lawyer Paul Biegler is the former prosecuting attorney of this small Michigan town who opts to represent the defendant.  This will be Paul’s first trial on the other side of the courtroom, and he recruits his best friend and colleague to help him, a washed-up lawyer and lovable drunk named Parnell (Arthur O’Connell).  Paul’s strategy is to defend his client with a plea of not guilty by reason of insanity because Manion is adamant he has no recollection of killing the victim with five gunshot wounds. 

Anatomy Of A Murder is easy to follow because it does not have a wealth of variables to twist the narrative in different directions.  The interest works on Stewart’s Capra-influenced likability.  George Bailey becomes a lawyer. The actor is older by this point in his career, and this performance would be his last Oscar nomination.  He’s sharp in the role and quick on his feet with objections and standard trial ligations.  He’s also adorably charming as he crafts fishhooks at the table while a witness is being questioned by opposing counsel.  That was a first for me to observe.

The prosecution has its small-time attorney, Mitch Lodwick, played with mustache-adorned, nerdy conservatism by Brooks West.  However, a big metropolitan lawyer sits next to him.  George C Scott might be early in his career here, with black slicked hair and dark suits as the imminent Claude Dancer, who notoriously arrives from Lansing, Michigan. He’s reputably intimidating and altogether sly.  He hardly says a word during the first third of his performance and his silence is impossible to ignore. However, when he takes lead counsel later in the story, Scott demonstrates that he’s the standout element of the picture.

Anatomy Of A Murder relies on the taboo nature of the crime on trial.  A rape of his wife motivates a suspect to kill.  In any circumstance, that is going to necessitate a discussion on the subject of ladies’ undergarments.  With a sidebar committee consisting of Stewart, West and Scott with the sleepy, elderly Judge Weaver (Joseph N Welch, famously part of the McCarthy hearings), the script includes time to debate how best to describe Laura Manion’s panties by going so far as to ask if there’s a more suitable word for “panties.”  The men are stumped and the Judge draws a line in the sand by declaring to the courtroom that any sort of chortling will not be tolerated.

In 1959, it’s unheard of to tarnish a person’s ears with vocabulary that includes “sperm,” “intercourse,” “penetration,” “climax,” “rape,” “panties,” “girdle,” and “bitch.”  Yikes!  My friend Anthony and I watched the Criterion Blu Ray of Preminger’s film, nominated for Best Picture, Screenplay and a trio of actors (Stewart, Scott and O’Connell) and we did our best to put our perspective in the past, before our time when Father Knows Best occupied television sets.  Yes.  It was likely shocking with a lot of gall to pull away the veil of sexual deviancy.  An intoxicated Lee Remick is no Donna Reed as she struts around in tight pants and low-cut blouses with a pair of sporty sunglasses.  On the stand, she describes her panties as either being white or pink with lace down the side and ripped off during her alleged assault.  Later, Jimmy Stewart is holding the evidence in clear view.  It couldn’t be anything but shocking.  Turn on any program today, and you’re apt to find any of this conjecture within an episode of Friends or Modern Family. Still, ‘the fella who spoke to Harvey the rabbit is fondling women’s underpants in a courtroom for everyone to see? For shame.

Laura Manion is also tested on the witness stand by Mr. Dancer when she declares she swore on a set of rosary beads. The attorney questions her faith with the Catholic church and if she is worthy of identifying herself as a Catholic any longer. Another person reveals being born out of wedlock. Something that no one should ever know. Religious conservatism tests the merits of its witnesses. In 1959, to say you swore on a set of rosary beads is not taken lightly. To be known as a bastard child is a social crime. Today, it’s just a phrase as common as saying “I swear on my children…” or you are just raised in a single parent home. The servitude of Anatomy Of A Murder has changed over decades of different generations when many are not so protective their personal sensibilities. The age of internet browsing allows everyone to be much more revealing in beliefs or lack thereof, and what constitutes as sexual appeal or how you originated.

Beyond the coarse language and subject matter of Anatomy Of A Murder, there’s not much here that feels fresh or pioneering any longer.  Today’s audiences are far too sophisticated for what Preminger was brash enough to originally show on screen. Anthony and I were certain that Laura’s adorable shaggy dog and a gold cigarette lighter that resurfaces a few times would lynchpin inevitable twists in the case.  Alas, it was just a dog, and alas it was just a lighter.  Yet, the attention to these items seemed like apparent invitations to significant developments.  

Actually, the one surprise that comes from the film is regrettably revealed too soon.  A material witness is disclosed midway through the picture.  However, when George C Scott questions this individual on the stand towards the end of movie, his character is the only one in the room who doesn’t know anything about this person.  With the audience already in on it, what is left to learn except to watch Scott’s character stand apart from everyone else? Had Anatomy Of A Murder been made today, the big reveal would have occurred in the courtroom for all to be surprised and intrigued.  Sidney Lumet’s The Verdict did that. Unfortunately, this is a terribly unfortunate misstep in execution.  It even takes away from Scott’s sensationally devious performance while sucking out potential dramatic heights.

As Paul waits for the jury to return with its verdict, Parnell ponders the dynamics of twelve strangers coming together to determine the fate of an accused.  It’s as if no one ever heard of a jury before this film was released.  Surely audiences, on the cusp of Perry Mason with Agatha Christie at the local library, were somewhat familiar with juries and judicial proceedings.  Anatomy Of A Murder is so simplified that it’s hard to embrace how heinous its evidence and testimonials should be.  

However, Jimmy Stewart performs like Andy Griffith’s famous characters, from Mayberry and Matlock.  The fella loves to fish and sit with his friend Parnell as they joyously read law books well into the night.  If a trial comes along, he might take it if he’s up for it. This guy is just so relaxed with himself and his practice which amonts to hardly any business and income as his faithful secretary, Maida (Eve Arden) reminds him for the run along relatable humor of the piece. Oh Maida, there you go again. Ribbing Paul all along!

Anatomy Of A Murder serves as a lookback to when movies were shedding their innocent, whitewashed skin. It anticipates that audiences will accept heinous crime and sexual deviancy. Otto Preminger trusts America’s favorite actor, Jimmy Stewart, to deliver. Lee Remick stands as an influence for those overly sexualized roles that Sharon Stone and Demi Moore would occupy thirty years later.

Preminger’s film has a widely recognized reputation with a bestowed ten Oscar nominations (though not including Otto Preminger). AFI ranks it as one of the top ten courtroom dramas, in the company 12 Angry Men and Judgment At Nuremberg. Criterion has a print edition within its library. Yet, seventy years after its introduction the temperature of the film is lukewarm, and the subjects are not so jaw dropping. As well, at nearly three hours running time, it could stand to have edited out so much irrelevant material that slows down the story and lends nothing to its characters.

Anatomy Of A Murder is upheld by its formula which I’d argue has been significantly more enhanced and leaner in movies to come, which drew from its inspiration. This is an anatomy of a courtroom crime drama, in its most basic form, when unmentionables might have been mentioned for the first time. I’m glad I didn’t die of embarrassment in front of Anthony. I mean I’ve heard of intercourse and I’ve seen women in girdles in a Glamour magazine (like George Costanza) before, and at the very least I’ve seen women’s panties on sale at Macy’s. If you have as well, then you are likely ready for Anatomy Of A Murder.

HAPPINESS (1998)

by Miguel E. Rodriguez

Director: Todd Solondz
Cast: Jane Adams, Jon Lovitz, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Dylan Baker, Lara Flynn Boyle, Louise Lasser, Ben Gazzara, Camryn Manheim, Molly Shannon
My Rating: 8/10
Rotten Tomatometer: 81% Certified Fresh

PLOT: Various characters, some linked, some not, struggle with the search for happiness in their lives.


A little history:

Todd Solondz’s film Happiness was so controversial that the Sundance Film Festival actually refused to screen it.  It was originally financed by October Films, but upon seeing the final product, October’s owner, Seagrams, dropped the film like a hot potato.  Happiness initially received an NC-17 rating, which would have immediately limited distribution opportunities, as well as created advertising difficulties.  Therefore, it was released unrated, uncut, and unaltered.

I remember reading about this movie years ago in Roger Ebert’s four-star review; he eventually labeled it one of the top ten movies of 1998.  I got curious, so, since this was in the days before Netflix – and I’m not sure Netflix would have made it available anyway – I snapped up the first DVD copy I could find and watched it.

And…um…oh my.  There are dark comedies (Pulp Fiction), and there are Dark Comedies (Dr. Strangelove).   And then there are DARK COMEDIES.  Happiness is a DARK COMEDY.

Remember that scene in Pulp Fiction when Marvin gets shot in the back of the car?  Remember the blood that covered the rear windshield and the blood and pieces of flesh and skull that were peppered all over John Travolta and Samuel L. Jackson?  Horrific, right?  But it was such a shocking moment that I remember laughing hysterically for the first few seconds after the incident, so that I missed the next few lines of dialogue from Vincent and Jules.

Happiness is like that.  You’re watching scenes of emotional devastation, but the circumstances under which they’re happening are…kinda funny.  Or at least funny in that shocked kind of way.  Your brain can’t quite believe what your eyes and ears are feeding it, and so you laugh.  At least, I did when I recently re-watched it with my girlfriend last night.  She didn’t do a lot of laughing, for the record.

The plot: We meet three sisters, Joy (Jane Adams), Helen (Lara Flynn Boyle), and Trish (Cynthia Stevenson).  Joy is an aspiring 30-something songwriter who still lives at home and has just broken up with her boyfriend in a scene that’s right at the top of the film and sets the appropriate mood: somewhere between funny and discomfort.  Helen is a moderately successful writer who has written a bestselling collection of poems about childhood rape.  Cynthia is a mother of two boys, married to a successful psychiatrist named Bill (Dylan Baker).  She seems to be the happiest of the three sisters, but she’s that kind of person who says things like, “You know, we all thought you would never amount to much, but NOW look at you!”

Cynthia’s husband, Bill, has a dark secret, one which I will not divulge here, but it’s revealed fairly early in the film.  He is a man so desperately in search of happiness that his efforts to fulfill his desires dance on the edge of farce.  He is so compelled to be happy (or at least what passes for happy in his mind) that he is, at one point, reduced to, um, “interfering with himself” in the backseat of his own car in broad daylight, risking discovery at every second by passers-by.

I haven’t even mentioned the part where he drugs the tuna fish sandwich.  Or ditches the PTA meeting for an impromptu “rendezvous.”  Or has a conversation with his 11-year-old son about why length doesn’t matter.  But enough about Bill for now.

Helen, the author, feels like a faker because she was, in fact, never raped as a child, so her happiness and success is built on lies.  She wishes her work could have more immediacy or legitimacy.  Then she could be REALLY happy.  And she might have a way: Daryl (Philip Seymour Hoffman), her next-door neighbor, is so obsessed with her that he finds it impossible to talk to her in person.  So he starts making obscene phone calls to her while he’s at work.  He gets the shock of his life when, after one call, she star-69s him and says, “I want to see you.”

And Joy…poor, ironically-named Joy.  Her trials and tribulations in the movie are more relatable than the others I’ve mentioned previously, so I’ll leave them alone for now.

Now, the subject matter of the movie has sparked controversy, as I mentioned earlier.  Are we, as an audience, expected to empathize with these characters?  Speaking as a guy who has had his fair share of heartbreaking crushes, I’ve gotta say I did empathize a bit with Daryl, the phone pervert.  I certainly don’t condone his behavior, but I was achingly aware of his thought processes as he stood in the elevator next to the object of his desire, desperate to talk to her, certain that she represents true happiness, but eternally unable to do anything about it.

I also identified a little with Kristina, played by Camryn Manheim.  She lives a couple of doors down from Daryl and is always knocking on his door to deliver tidbits of news.  (“Our doorman was found bludgeoned to death in his apartment this morning…supposedly his penis was missing.”)  She is clearly crushing on Daryl, but Daryl is oblivious in the face of his own crush.  Their relationship, or lack thereof, pays off in a scene set in a diner during which a secret is revealed that sees the Marvin scene from Pulp Fiction and raises.

But what about Bill, Cynthia’s husband with the dark secret?  While I can relate to characters like Kristina and Daryl and Joy, what is this distasteful nonsense doing in this movie?  Let’s make no bones about it: Bill is a monster, enslaved to desires he can’t understand; he can only bend to their will.  Does that make him an object of sympathy?  SHOULD that make him an object of sympathy?  There’s an excruciating scene where Bill’s son asks him very, VERY specific questions about his compulsion, and to our amazement, instead of shying away from them, Bill tearfully answers them honestly and directly, including that last question that I had completely forgotten was in the movie.  Does this honesty make Bill honorable?  Previous scenes have shown that Bill is always honest with his son, and he makes the decision not to break that streak, even when the answers are shameful and, probably for some, gag-inducing.

My take: Bill’s crimes and desires have made him irredeemable, in my book.  But…BUT…he did the right thing by being honest with his son.  In that ONE sense, I have to give the character props.  If I were in his place, I’m not sure I would have done the same thing.

Geez, I just realized I haven’t even mentioned another subplot about the parents of the three sisters who have relocated to Florida and are undergoing a separation (NOT a divorce!), even though they’re still living in the same house.  Eh, I’ll leave that one alone, too.

So anyway.  Whenever I read a review that gets this long-winded, I always find myself asking the question, “Yeah, but is it any GOOD?”

Yes, it is.  It’s literate, compelling, and funny, but you may hate yourself for laughing afterwards.  That’s the genius of the movie.  It creates these situations that you laugh at, but when you try to describe the scene to your friends, they just stare at you in abject horror.

(I give it an 8 instead of a higher score just on the basis of the “icky” feeling I get when watching some of the scenes.  You’ve been warned.)