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PAGE 6 — November 30,1972
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LIFE IN MUSIC
By The Dameans
CORNER OF THE SKY
Everything has its season
Everything has its time
Show me a reason
And I’ll soon show you a rhyme
Cats sit on the window sill
Children sit in the show
Why do I feel
I don’t fit in anywhere I go
Rivers belong where they can ramble
Eagles belong where they can fly
I’ve got to be where my spirit can run free
Got to find my corner of the sky
Everyman has his daydream
Everyman has his goal
People have to want dreams
Have them sticking to the soul
Thunderclouds have their lightning
Nightengales have their song
And don’t you see I want my life
To be something more than long
Rivers belong where they can ramble
Eagles belong where they can fly
I’ve got to be where my spirit can run free
Got to find my corner of the sky
So many men seemed destined
To settle for something small
But I, I won’t rest
Until I know I have it all
So then I swear I’m going
But listen when I’m gone
Follow when you hear me
Singing softly to the dawn
Rivers belong where they can ramble
Eagles belong where they can fly
I’ve got to be where my spirit can run free
God to find my corner of the sky
--By S. Schwartz
(c 1972 Stephen Schwartz Jobete Music Co., Inc. & Belwin-Mills Pub. Cor.
(ASCAP)
The Jackson Five have produced hit after hit as a matter of course. Their
success is due in large part to their wide-open sound and their sensitivity to
highly-interesting beats.
But among all their hits, “Corner of the Sky” is an especially fine one. The
song is not only pleasant to hear, but it says something solid.
“Corner of the Sky” is a statement about searching. It soundly beats out its
quest for a place where a man can fit into life, a place where “my spirit can run
free.” It sets out the daydream, the soaring hope for a goal that is worthwhile. More
than anything the song says: “I want my life to be something more than long.”
The song, “Corner of the Sky” is an engaging reminder of another story of
search to be found in the national best-selling book, “Jonathan Livingston
Seagull.” The story of Jonathan is a truly inspiring presentation of a gull who
refused to live out his life simply gathering enough food for the next day. Life is
for flying, for doing what is graceful and beautiful - not for boredom.
The similarity between the message of Jonathan and that of “Corner of the
Sky” is striking. Both are stories in which the normal pattern of life is to “settle
for something small.” Both believe intuitively in a goal, a dream which is worth
all the work and sacrifice of life.
But most of all both are songs of commitment to a goal that can only be
described in terms of the “sky.” Both Jonathan and “Corner of the Sky”
highlight the moments that leave behind the routine of life and draw even closer
to a greater ideal.
“Corner of the Sky” is a reminder to all of us that it is easy to be swamped
with the daily crush of our lives. It recalls the temptation to live out our days
safely without much risk. Yet, at the same time, the song challenges us to
remember that at least once we were willing to risk all for the dream that was
ours.
The message is a hard one for us to retain because so few people really seem
to believe in it. And we find it very difficult to run alone against the stream of
society which cynically regards life as “putting in time” or “ending in death.” So
it becomes necessary for those of us who do believe to gather together to tell
each other of our aspirations, to support one another in our search. “Follow
when you hear me singing.”
The special happiness of the Jackson Five’s song is found in the confidence
that there is a place where we all belong. There is a place where our spirits will
be free.
“Comer of the Sky” is a fine song, and, even better, it contains a fine
message. “Got to find my corner of the sky” - for all of us who want to believe.
(All correspondence should be directed to: The Dameans, St. Joseph Church, 216 Patton
Ave., Box 5188, Shreveport, Louisiana 71105)
TV Movies
SUNDAY, DECEMBER 3 - 9:00 p.m.
(ABC) -- IN HARM’S WAY (1965) -- Heavy
wartime melodrama bears the familiar stamp
of director Otto Preminger, who casts aside
the significant details of post-attack Pearl
Harbor in order to dwell on the seamy,
semi-secret lives of his principals, John
Wayne, Kirk Douglas and Patricia Neal. Film
seems to say that all’s fair in love and war -
especially when the two go together. (B)
MONDAY, DECEMBER 4 - 9:00 p.m.
(NBC) -- THE HIRED HAND (1971) -
Offbeat, sensitive and quiet little Western
directed by and starring Peter Fonda. The tale
of a young man turning away from his life as
a drifter in order to return to the wife, child,
and farm he deserted years back is probably
too slow for most Western fans. But those
who stick with it will find the film rewarding
in the way it attempts to sort out human
values and relationships. Warren Oates as
Fonda’s sidekick gives a subtle performance
and figures in a gentle resolution that follows
a climactic outburst of frontier violence.
(A-lll)
TUESDAY, DECEMBER 5 - 8:30 p.m.
(ABC) - THE COUPLE TAKES A WIFE - An
average, middle-class couple hires on a
sexy domestic helper, who creates all of
the household chaos you’ve probably already
seen in countless romantic comedies of this
ilk. Bill Bixby, Paula Prentiss, Valerie Perrine
star.
9:30 p.m. (CBS) -• A WAR OF CHILDREN
-- Original dramatic television film set in
strife-stricken contemporary Belfast,
Northern Ireland. Focus of the drama by
James Costigan in a 10-year-old boy
undergoing a change of heart in the terrible
conflict that, for all practical purposes, is
eight or nine centuries old. The film, because
of its themes concerning tne war <■■■ ci its
quality of achievement, is a likely candidate
for this year’s Emmy.
THURSDAY, DECEMBER 7 - 9:00 p.m.
(CBS) -- THE AFRICAN QUEEN (1951) -
One of the best films ever made? Quite
possibly; certainly it is one of the most
striking in its tale of African adventure
around the time of early World War I. John
Huston directs the high adventure which finds
Katherine Hepburn as a prim missionary who
enlists the aid of rough riverboatman
Humphrey Bogart to help her flee the
Germans. They share a harrowing voyage
down a wild Congo river, and gradually
develop a relationship that changes both their
lives -- for the better. (A-ll)
SATURDAY, DECEMBER 9 - 9:00 p.m.
(NBC) -- LOVE IS A BALL (1963) Frothy
romantic comedy is set on the glittering
French Riviera and stars Glen Ford, Hope
Lange and Charles Boyer (at his charming
best). The plot, a necessary evil in this sort of
production, involves Boyer’s attempts at
matchmaking, which inevitably get all crossed
up - particularly where Ford and Ms. Lange
are concerned. Well, at least nobody breaks
into a song. (A-lll)
RELIGIOUS TELEVISION HIGHLIGHT
SUNDAY, DECEMBER 3 (CBS) - LOOK
UP AND LIVE: “And Due Discretion” --This
film documentary examines the new
procedures and techniques used to speed up
annulment cases in the Church today, as
exemplified in the Marriage Tribunal of the
Brooklyn Diocese. The program focusses on
the Tribunal’s use of psychological testing and
the testimony of the court's psychiatrist in
reaching a decision in one annulment plea.
(Check local listings for exact time in your
area.)
BLACK BISHOP AND BISHOP-ELECT -- America’s only black members of the with Cardinal John Krol of Philadelphia, at the U.S. bishops’ meeting near Washington,
hierarchy, Auxiliary Bishop Harold R. Perry (right) of New Orleans, La., and D.C. (NC Photo)
Bishop-elect Joseph Howze, who will be an auxiliary in Natchez-Jackson, Miss., talk
“Reverse Mission” Seen Key
BY JERRY FILTEAU
WASHINGTON (NC) - The concept
of “reverse mission” - the effect that
mission generosity has on the country
which helps the missions - was one of
the recurring themes at the National
Mission Animation Conference here.
The conference, described by its
organizers as the first full scale U.S.
missionary congress in 60 years, was
attended by 700 persons: missionaries
home on furlough, other members of
religious orders and missionary societies,
diocesan Propagation of the Faith
directors^ college students and
seminarians.
At a conference, held at the Catholic
Univeristy of America and sponsored by
the U.S. Catholic Mission Council
(USCMC), Father Joseph M. Connors,
USCMC executive secretary said that in
the past four years the number of U.S.
missionaries abroad has dropped from
9,655 to 7,649.
This missionary crisis, Father
Connors said, “is only a product of
many other general crises in society and
the Church which inevitably affect
missionary activity.”
Much of the discussion during the
four days centered around a positive
approach to this crisis in terms of
“reverse mission.”
Archbishop Sergio Pignedoli,
Secretary of the Vatican Congregation
for the Evangelization of Peoples,
focused on this even when he told an
audience of about 1,000 people,
including over 200 high school students,
that the important thing is “generosity
- giving oneself to others.”
The archbishop said the thing that
impressed him about young people was
“their realization that it is through giving
oneself that a person becomes ‘some
body.’ ”
Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen, former
national director of the Society for the
Propagation of the Faith, approached
the “reverse mission” concept from
another angle.
Archbishop Sheen preached at a
“Mass of the Nations” in the National
Shrine of the Immaculate Conception,
concelebrated by more than 200 of the
nation’s bishops and attended by 2,000
people. Decrying the drop in vocations
and the numbers leaving the priesthood
and sisterhood, he said:
“This is a very opportune time for
every diocese in the United States to
sponsor a priest through the Society for
the Propagation of the Faith in a
mission nation for every priest who has
left the altar.”
“Every order of Sisters in the United
States,” he continued, should sponsor a
convent in a mission country as a means
of “healing the wounds in their own
orders.”
Archbishop Sheen said that a
revitalized missionary attitude in the
United States was essential to a strong,
vital faith among American Catholics.
The theme of “reverse mission”
recurred in many of the speical
workshop sessions throughout the
conference. One special mission that
focused on life styles drew so many
participants that it had to be moved
from an auditorium to the main church
of the National Shrine.
The dominant theme of the
discussion was the affect of a returning
missionary could have in making
Americans aware of the contrast
between their own affluence and the
poverty prevalent in most of the world.
According to Jesuit Father William F.
Ryan, chairman of the special session
and program director for the Center of
Concern here, the missionary gets this
message across to the people at home
principally through personal witness, by
having adopted “an alternate life style
of poverty and dedication.”
Father Ryan pointed out that when a
missioner returns home, he brings back
with him “a different world view, a new
perspective of America.”
Among other topics discussed at the
conference were the development of
vocations for the missions, increasing
C — Condemned
THE DISCREET CHARM OF THE
BOURGEOISIE (Fox) — Luis Bunuel's new
film, THE DISCREET CHARM OF THE
BOURGEOISIE, takes such a fresh and
zestful approach to its material that it seems
as if, at 72, Bunuel is starting his career all
over again. Perhaps his previous film,
TRISTANA, served to exercise his demons,
and he is now free to enjoy the direction in
which his socio-critical spirit might take h*m.
In any event, his scorn for middle class
hypocrisy remains as scratching as ever but his
treatment of it is more playful and lighter
than in any previous work. With effortless
ease, Bunuel takes us through an incredibly
complicated series of events, such as dreamers
dreaming of other dreamers, that grows more
satisfying as the narrative becomes more
outrageously illogical. It is satire of a special,
free-flowing sort.
The central recurring situation is that of six
wealthy friends about to sit down to dinner
but always being interrupted by something
which prevents them from being able to
proceed with the meal. The first anecdotes
seem to be real, but as the film progresses
events become identified as dreams; this
explains not only the bizarre nature of the
incidents but the participants’ acceptance of
them as natural. When, in the final dream, the
meal is at last safely underway, terrorists
burst into the house and slaughter everyone at
the table. THE DISCREET CHARM is, in
other words, a film without a plot but with a
firm structure, one that communicates its
ideas through its images rather than through
its narrative.
Bunuel’s satire is very dense and
paradoxical, with layer upon layer of
significance if we care to pursue his images.
After seeing the film, one can probably never
go to another dinner party without a slightly
new eye and ear for the banalities that pass
for sophistication. But Bunuel is also
questioning the power structure and the
parasitic nature of the ruling class. The film,
however, is not meant to spell out any
coherent system of social philosophy but to
reawaken us to the issues of social justice. For
example, when a bishop joins the group in
civilian garb he causes consternation because
to them the office or role is more important
than personal integrity.
The acting is exceptional, especially that
of Fernando Rey who as the ambassador of
the fictional Latin American republic of
Miranda is the film’s central character. His
suave urbanity in even the most ludricous
situation is exactly right for getting the most
humor from his role. Although the film is
uncompromising in its satire of the
bourgeoisie, Bunuel has not attempted to
dehumanize them. He seems genuinely
amused by them and it may be his most
positive film in that he has compassion for all
his characters, even the most empty-headed
and unjust. He uses an image showing them
walking down a deserted highway through an
empty countryside that indicates he sees them
as a group of pilgrims seeking, as all of us are,
some destination in life.
THE DISCREET CHARM, however, is not
the kind of film that yields up to neat
intellectualization. It is above all meant to be
enjoyed as something as playful as the title
itself. Of all Bunuel’s non-commercial films,
this is the one in which his ideas are most
accessible to a wide audience. There are a
number of directors with a deep social
consciousness but few who share Bunuel’s
strict moral vision or his genius for bringing it
to life on the screen. The final irony would be
the runaway success of BOURGEOISIE at the
boxoffice. (A-lll)
WEDNESDAY’S CHILD (Cinema 5) is
British director Ken Loach’s sensitive,
absorbing, but occasionally unsound portrait
of a young woman retreating into a shell of
madness. The film errs in heavily placing all of
the blame for the girl’s condition on her
surroundings -- her home life, her
the awareness of children and adults
towards missionary activities, increased
cooperation among various societies and
organizations in the mission effort, the
theology of the missions, and the need
to develop in American Catholics a
global vision of the Church.
One special meeting was organized by
a group of participants to discuss the
possibility of developing a national
missionary training institute. The
participants pointed out that no
institute of higher education in the
misunderstanding parents, uncaring doctors.
Yet the film is quite fascinating in its
performances - Sandy Ratcliff as the young
woman, Bill Dean and Grace Cave as her
parents. They areanimated, natural, and
convincing actors, and the result, no matter
how we feel about the director’s handling of
theme and blame, is a movie inhabited by
people we care about. (A-lll)
THE DEADLY TRAP (National General)
Faye Dunaway and Frank Langella play a
mismatched, expatriate American couple
living inParis with their two little children.
Langella is a silent type (he keeps a threat
from an industrial-spy mob secret), and Miss
Dunaway is on the verge of madness (she loses
track of the kids and keeps forgetting things).
When the children disappear things get very
complicated as Faye searches her fogged brain
for some vital clues. Frank tries to play the
cat-and-mouse game with the mob and the
police cast a suspicious eye on dotty Faye. If
all of this (including a sudden happy ending)
seems contrived and confused, it is only
because it is, thanks to the cluttered, too-tight
direction of Rene Clement and the illogical,
loose writing of Eleanor Perry, Sidney
Buchman, and M. Clement. The movie’s not a
total loss, in any case: Paris and Miss
Dunaway are equally lovely, and her
performance under the difficult circumstances
is superb. (A-ll)
FAREWELL UNCLE TOM
(Euro-Int’l./Cannon) Gualtiero Jacopetti an;
Franco Prosperi have been responsible for a
long and dismayingly popular series of
pseudo-documentaries (from MONDO CANE
to AFRICA ADDIO). This time their subject
is an historical one, slavery in America,
an;they have restaged it in the manner of the
CBS “You Are There” series. Their
voyeuristic treatment of the subject is simply
vicarious flesh-peddling and the concluding
section, specially prepared for the American
version of this Italian film, can only deepen
racial misunderstanding. The picture was
filmed mostly in Haiti, and one wishes that
the government of that troubled land had
prohibited the exploitation of its poor
inhabitants. (C)
TREASURE ISLAND (National General)
Perhaps film performances tend to gain
stature in the retrospect of memory but this
latest rendering of the Robert Louis
Stevenson classic seems to be the least
successful of any version to date. Orsan Welles
displays here none of the flamboyant charm
of Robert Newton’s Long John Silver or, for
that matter, Wallace Berry’s and in sum, the
entire production directed by John Hough
suffers from a rather uninspired literal
approach to the high adventrue of the novel.
Aside from Welles’ garbled diction, which
resembles nothing so much as an Irish
interpretation of Eliza Doolittle, there is little
worthy of comment in this TREASURE
ISLAND. Angel del Pozo’s Doctor Livesey,
Walther Slezak’s Squire Trelawney and young
Kim Burfield’s Jim Hawkins are all pretty
much cardboard caricatures of larger figures,
who simply read their lines against the pretty
Spanish seacoast. Nonetheless, the little ones
will still enjoy this classic tale of buried
treasure. For the rest of us whose memories
go back at least to Basil Rathbone’s voice on
the old 78's, there may be more pleasure in
conjuring up our own visuals to go with such
classics of the language as “Them that dies
will be the lucky ones!” (A-l)
SON OF BLOB (Jack H. Harris) Even
BLOBS deserve to ooze into their niche in
movie sequels, and once again the creeping
crimson mass has fun overrunning Small
Town, U.S.A. The older yokels, it appears, are
content to sit back and sip their beers as the
shapeless menace slithers over them, while the
younger generation is too preoccupied with
fast cars and loud parties to notice the
stranger in their midst. Blob, Jr., spares no
one as it rolls on to strike panic in the local
bowling alley where Robert Walker, Jr. is
oinned with girlfriend Gwynne Gilford. This
United States has a degree program in
the study of the missions.
They noted that there were intensive
training sessions, mission furlough
seminars for updating missioners who
were home on leave, and occasional
mission courses in seminaries.
However, they said, there is a great
need for a professional national center
for ongoing mission training. They
urged that the possibilities of such a
center be looked into more fully, as an
important step towards revitalizing
America’s mission effort.
fearless couple have consumed enough Jello in
their lifetime, however, to remember how to
stifle the invader with the same chilling device
that Steve McQueen and company employed
against Blob, Sr., 14 years ago. SON OF
BLOB is nothing more than a glob of
unrelated episodes geared to glean smiles
instead of screams from undemanding
viewers. To this effect the actors in league
with actor-director Larry Hagman improvise
much of their material, and full-fledged
comedians Godfrey Cambridge and Shelley
Berman contribute delightful cameos. (A-ll)
TRICK BABY (Universal) Set in
Philadelphia, the City of Brotherly Love, this
gritty number sets about showing how a
couple of the brothers indulge their love of
hustling. The pair is a perfect match: one (Mel
Stewart) is black and called Blue, and the
other (Kiel Martin) is white and called Folks,
short for "White Folks,” although he keeps
reminding us that he was BORN black and
only LOOKS white. Together they are truly
democratic in their hustle, doing the number
of such assorted victims as an Italian dealer in
stolen goods, a group of affluent whites from
the Main Line, a black plainclothes cop, a
gun-toting black tourist, etc., etc. With some
nifty inner-city camera work and a
tough-talking script by T Raewyn, director
Larry Yust makes an entertaining game of
watching the con men do their thing and keep
one jump -- well, almost -- ahead of the
avenging cop and organized mob. Those who
can withstand the basic ingredients of rough
language, semi-explicit nudity and an
ambiance of all-around genial amorality,
might enjoy themselves and learn a few things
to boot -- either how to hustle for a living, or
how it was they were hustled. (A-IV)
THE UNHOLY ROLLERS (AIP) With a
shopworn demeanor that belies her status as a
former "Playmate of the Year” (don't ask
WHAT year), Claudia Jennings whizzes
through this cheap sex-and-violence exploiter
that bears the old Roger Corman stamp of
rough stuff combined with tongue-in-cheek
burlesque humor. The action involves the
young girl’s break into big-time roller derby,
which for all means slugging it out like
animals on one tank-town rink after another
(no matter where the team is headed, the bus
always says “Muncie”). In between the
breast-bashing, groin-stomping and other
sporting events, Miss Jennings finds plenty of
time to place her allegedly award-winning
physique on public display. The only glimmer
of redeeming value in the film, and it is only a
glimmer, is the running “color commentary”
provided throughout by an inspired pair of
off-camera ringside announcers. ROLLERS
does the impossible - it makes the KANSAS
CITY BOMBER seem positively radiant by
comparison. (C)
RECENT FILM CLASSIFICATIONS
Snowball Express (Walt Disney/B.V.) •• A-l
Jory (Avco-Embassy) -- A-ll
1776 (Columbia) - A-ll
Companeros (Cinerama) -- A-lll
Carry On, Doctor (AIP) -- A-lll
The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean
(National General) -- A-lll
Rage (Warners) -- A-lll
Three Bullets for a Long Gun (Maron) -
A-lll
Trouble Man (Fox) -- A-lll
Two People (Universal) - A-IV
Cactus in the Snow (General Film) - B
The Virgin Witch (Joe Brenner) - C
Film Classifications
A — Section I — Morally Unobjectionable for General Patronage
A — Section D — Morally Unobjectionable for Adults, Adolescents
A — Section HI — Morally Unobjectionable for Adults
A — Section IV — Morally Unobjectionable for Adults, Reservations
B — Morally Objectionable in Part for All