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COUNTERCULTURE
Mo' Boring Blues and Two Boring Jakes
by Terry Francis
Mo' Better Blues—1/2★—Anti-Semitic and a disaster.
In telling the story of the brilliant and self-absorbed jazz
trumpeter Bleek Gilliam (Denzel Washington, in a glib,
unsatisfying performance), director Spike Lee relies on just
about every white hand-me-down cliche you can think of,
and impastes his film with anti-Semitic and misogynist
veneers that are blatantly offensive.
The women in this film are a peculiar lot indeed. First
we meet Bleek's mother, who, in a flashback set in
Brooklyn in 1969, hounds the child Bleek in her excruciat
ingly loud voice to practice his trumpet when he begs her
to let him go outside and play with his friends. She's that
Freudian staple of simplistic Hollywood movies—the
domineering Bitch as Mother.
Then the film cuts to the present day, after Bleek has
gained notoriety as the leader of a popular jazz band called
the Bleek Quintet. He appears to serve as the locus for the
lives of nearly all the characters we meet, including the dis
satisfied members of the Quintet, led by saxophonist
Shadow Henderson (Wesley Snipes, giving the film's best
performance, all forceful and sexy).
We also meet Bleek's gambling addict manager Giant
(Spike Lee in a secondary role given disproportionate
screen time and a lame performance by Lee), and Bleek's
two girlfriends, Indigo and Clarke, whom he treats with
casual indifference.
The film divides its women characters into the usual
stereotypes—saints (the schoolteacher, Indigo, played by
Spike's sister Joie Lee) and women who whore themselves
(the sleeping-to-the-top singer, Clarke, played by Cynda
Williams), both of whom take emotional abuse and yet lick
their men's egos worshipfully.
A chief problem of the film is that nearly everything
that happens is a version of something that's already hap
pened in other movies. Mo' Better Blues is like a bizarre
variant of one of Douglas Sirk's camp classics from the
fifties, such as Magnificent Obsession, in which people
must suffer nobly, degradingly, and masochistically before
they know redemption.
Lee directs unimpressively at the flash point. In one
scene he cuts melodramatically between Bleek onstage
bringing down the house and Giant getting pummeled in an
alley by his bookie's thugs for non-payment of a gambling
debt. The scene is lifted directly from Cabaret.
A few scenes later, Bleek returns to the stage after tak
ing a year off so his lip can heal from injuries received
when he went to Giant's aid in the alley. But Bleek is pub
licly humiliated a la Norman Maine in A Star is Born when
his playing is awful. Wouldn't he know before going
onstage that he could no longer play?
Poor Bleek. He must Learn. He must be taught a
Lesson. He must know Purification through Suffering. He
goes back to the schoolmarm Indigo, begs her to marry
him and bear him a son of a Bleek (no mention of a daugh
ter). Never has a busted lip carried with it such moral force,
such possibilities for redemption of the soul. Could it be
that Spike is the person to direct a remake of Madame X?
The film's anti-Semitism surfaces in the scenes involv
ing the owners of the club where the Bleek Quintet per
forms. The slimy pair are called Moe and Joe, and they are
stereotyped money-hungry Jews whose morality is based
Spike Lee has done the wrong thing
with Mo' Better Blues
solely on greed. Perhaps Madame X is the wrong film for
Lee to direct. Perhaps a film by him on the death camps
could provide him some enlightenment.
The Two Jakes—★—This long-awaited sequel to
Chinatown is a flat-out bore. Jack Nicholson stars again as
the L.A. private eye Jake Gittis who specializes in divorce
cases based on adultery. The clincher in the film this time
is that Nicholson may have been used by one of his own
clients as a pawn in a premeditated murder case. (I guessed
the plot's outcome immediately, and you will too.)
As in the earlier film, what we perceive to be the main
plot turns out to be a red herring for a larger crime, a more
pervasive corruption. But Chinatown was directed by
Roman Polanski, a bom filmmaker. It featured a ravishing
production design, silken photography, seamless editing,
and an appealingly lush musical score.
Polanski's film had a bevy of eccentric characters mov
ing through a landscape beautiful on the outside and rotting
on the inside.
From beginning to end, Nicholson's film is sloppily
made. It has been photographed in a variety of visual clich
es, such as the two actors framed against a grandiose
ceiling (out of The Untouchables), and further lacks visual
consistency even within scenes.
In one scene, Nicholson is photographed against a win
dow opening onto an expanse of clouds drifting in a beauti
ful rust and blue dusk. Then, less than twenty seconds later,
a whole different sky appears behind Nicholson—darkling
blue and cloudless, from out of nowhere.
The film makes a big to-do in introducing a character
played by David Keith, who then disappears for nearly two
hours. It never establishes a consistent tone, and is smeared
in a lot of phony tough guy Nicholson voice-overs.
Jakes is structured around a series of endless—and I
mean endless—expository conversations that nibble
around the edges of the dumb plot (which turns out to have
more to do with Poltergeist than Chinatown).
It also features women who say "no" but mean "yes,"
and a scene set in a gay bar out of the Twilight Zone.
Everyone does their worst work, from the great cinematog
rapher Vilmos Zsigmond to the scenarist Robert Towne to
the musical composer, Van Dyke Parks. The Two Jakes, sad
to say, is negligible. What a disappointment!
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Atlantis Connection
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1402 N. Highland in Morningside • 881-6511
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s Music, Aid ^
Come join us for
a fun and exciting
Labor Day Weekend — August 30 - September 3 1990
Atop Lookout Mountain where Tennessee, Alabama and Georgia meetl
700 acres of beautiful private land with lakes, hiking trails, cabins, tennis courts, lots
of flat land for camping, moonlit hayrides, canoeing, and much, much morel
•MUSICAL PERFORMERS*COMICS*SPEAKERS*DANCE BANDS• THEATRE•
Holly Near with Adrienne Tort • Casselberry-DuPree & Band • Mary Gemini • Lea DeLaria • Jacque & Joyce
• Rene Hicks • Laura Berkson • Marga Gomez • Toshi Reagon & Band • Michelle Crone • Angela Bowen
• Mandy Carter • Marjy Plant • Bootsie Abelson • Alix Dobkin • Reel World String Band • Cathy Woolard •
Ayofemi Stowe Folayan • Cindy Graves & Gospel Group • Duo • Angela Motter • S.A.M.E Theater •
Kay Hagan • Yer Girlfriend • Kathy Kelly • and more plus very exciting guest stars!
Festival Includes: music, comedy, theater, dance, crafts, sports, workshops, camping, food, swim
ming, square dancing, films, videos, political tent, speakers. Women-only space, over-40's space, on-site General
Store, Midnight Cafe, Disabled Resources. All concerts interpreted for the hearing impaired; showers and port
able toilets provided. No dogs permitted, except seeing-eye or hearing-impaired (must be registered). Festival
ends Monday at 3 p.m.
TICKETS: 5-DAY: Thurs-Mon; 4-DAY: Fri-Mon; 3-DAY: Sat-Mon
CABIN: only 125 spaces available, so reserve early. Rooms 12-20 women with bunks.
RV’s: Plenty of space but no hookups. RV ticket includes admission for one; others can purchase camping tickets.
CHILDREN: 3-8 yrs. old $30; 9-16 yr. old women $40. All children must be pre-registered for childcare by July
1st 1990. No overnight childcare; “potty-trained” only; boys 8 and under welcome.
PAYMENT: Money Order, certified check or cash. For tickets along with brochure and map, send self addressed,
legal size, stamped envelope to RHYTHM FEST, 604 W. CHAPEL HILL ST., DURHAM, NC 27701
INFO: (919) 682-6374; Fax (919) 682-5601; FOR CRAFTS INFO: (919) 687-4203
WORKSHOPS: Send description of workshop if you wish it listed.
OPEN MIC: Limited slots for theater and dance. Send videos early
TICKET ORDER FORM
Purchase tickets early. Space limited to 1200. Tickets at gate $10 above top sliding scale. Cash Only.
Name _
Address.
City
Phone
. State.
.Zip.
RV: (includes 1 ticket) 5 days $195 □ 4 days $185 □
CABIN: (limited spaces) 5 days $180-185 4 days $155-165 DNon-smoking OSmoking nciean/Sober
CAMPING: 5 day (Thu-Mon) $160-170 4 day (Fri-Mon) $140-150 3 day (Sat-Mon; limited passes) $120-130
9-16 yr. old women $40 3-8 yr. old children $30 TOTAL
I’d like info on: □ Disabled Resources □ Childcare □ Work Exchange ENCLOSED
□ I'd like to buy a Rhythm Fest T-shirt at the festival ff Size
All festival participants will need to sign a liability release form. No Refunds.
Southern Voice/August 16,1990
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