Gary Cooper: The Signature Collection

[zedz]

I saw Sergeant York for the first time recently and it seemed to me a film clearly out of Hawks' comfort zone: stock characters, weak women, irony-free, folksy, hagiographic. The problem, for me, was that he didn't really know what tone to strike in many scenes, and the performances end up similarly uncertain (ouch, those drunk scenes). Ford, at his best, could make the American rustic / mythic work beautifully (as in Young Mr Lincoln) by playing it completely straight. But even Ford could (often) stumble with folksy material. Hawks can't really do this stuff straight because it seems to be so alien to his core values.

Rather than beat the film up over its failure to match up to contemporary standards / values, I'm more interested in the ways in which it fails to mearure up to its contemporaries (Fordian Americana, Hawks' other work).

I actually find the story of making the film much more interesting than the film itself, so I got more out of the rather dry commentary.

And since it came up, I'm happy to register my loathing for Schindler's List! Even at his worst, Hawks never got that bad!

[Gregory]

Rather than beat the film up over its failure to match up to contemporary standards / values...

For the record, I would distance myself from any impressions that that's what my response to the film was -- at all. Of course you might have had lubitsch's post in mind.

...I'm more interested in the ways in which it fails to mearure up to its contemporaries (Fordian Americana, Hawks' other work).

This is what some of us have been beating around the bush over numerous times here, but it's hard to do even begin such a comparison without writing a long tome of a post. Ford's war films (20th c.) would make a great comparison, too.

[HerrSchreck]

....

[HerrSchreck]

I saw Sergeant York for the first time recently and it seemed to me a film clearly out of Hawks' comfort zone: stock characters, weak women, irony-free, folksy, hagiographic.
Rather than beat the film up over its failure to match up to contemporary standards / values, I'm more interested in the ways in which it fails to mearure up to its contemporaries (Fordian Americana, Hawks' other work).!

I say to comrade zedz (your screen name always gives me vertigo when I hear it in my head... what does it mean?) with all due respect that if one held the buffer of

stock characters, weak women, irony-free, folksy, hagiographic.

over every pre '60 genre film you'd be left with a few documentaries. Certainly the vast bulk of Ford/Wayne, Hawks in sum, the whole Mann catalog (his noirs are 100% amped up stereotypes), and just about every piece of war/western/gangster pic are inhabited by weak women and stereotypical characters with very little development.

As to how it measures up against it's contemporaries-- this is all very personal and subjective, and I rarely can explain my joy in many simple film melodramas based on a factor of measuring up. That's even more alien to me than finding agreement/offense in historical terms. I either like the film or I don't. Why do I like Twizzlers or Ludens mixed fruit cough drops? I just love them, and give little thought about why... unless it's something I'm superfanatical about, then you'll hear me going on and on due to watching it every day.

I really really really mean it when I say that we've lost something here that we had when we were young and impressionable, if we cannot drift away into a simple piece of entertainment without this ponderous language of consideration and comparative analysis of mise en scene (which I admit to be a primary chimney spout of).

Greg, I'd just like to reinforce, in response to

I watch movies like that sometimes but there are a lot of ideological themes running through both the best and the worst film has to offer and would feel I were missing out if I didn't ever engage these aspects and learn from them

that once again, via the last part of that statement, I'm not saying that I don't engage these parts of the film. The failings in historical terms of YORK are obvious to me and flash on and off like neon and require no engagement. My point, and you'll see it in all my above posts, is that it is possible to maintain your fierce fidelity to the truth, yet find escape and enjoyment in a simple, folksy aw shucks kinda tale. The failings of YORK in terms of intelligence, in terms of baseline cognizance of Basic Facts, are as plain and simple as those I note on the radio, on the news, in my family, in my teachers when I was in school, in my friends, in this aggravating studio I work in. I simply cannot allow myself to be driven crazy by it in all corners of my life. I can't stop noting it, ever, but I sure can learn to sit back and have fun. This was one of the biggest successes in my personal life after turning 30-- calming down and letting myself enjoy this kind of stupid shit. I reflexively seek the truth on any nonfiction subject I engage in the cinema. For example, the raves about THE SUN caused me to pick up the AEye disc... and as I know quite a bit about WW2 but very little about Hirohito's "last bunker days of the war", I spent the next couple of days in deep research about him nonstop. But that's just the way I am. I'm such an extreme example I take a little bit of unmbrage at being told this kind of stuff. But of course we don't really "know" one another, and so it's all part of intellgient convo.

I'd like to chime in here and say of course this is all very subjective-- if Lubitsch simply doesn't like the film, that's unimpeachable. It's just my sense that reckoning with 100% historical fidelity as a guideline of thumbs-up-down on an old war picture or genre piece from the golden age is crazy... or conversely, poo-pooing a man for liking such lite fun on those terms is silly. I have a library filled with monstrously impressive cinema, and I think it's an important excercise for the brain to be able to put that stuff down for a time and enjoy a simple film like a child again, in those purest of terms.

And you guys know what a gut holding, floor rolling weakness I have for contradictory impulses imbalancing a film, stereotypical characters delivering stilted lines, strangeness, and outright novel antique badness. I have a catalog filled with cinematic gods, and to offset it I love shitty films of a certain stripe and pedigree, though YORK falls more into simple all american sunday afternoon fun. I won't compare Twizzlers licoriche to goose liver-- I just like it, end of story, who cares "why" in terms of "cooking"? It's just a snack, I dig it, hell with it. (Anyone comes on with diabetes or cavitities I'm stamping me bleedin feet down!)

That said I hope the blankness of internet posting doesn't null the sense of my respect for the opinions & intelligence of all involved. We are who are, I'm certainly no average specimen.

And sir z, I know you're not alone in despising SCHINDLER. But you don't like THIEF OF BAGDAD either so (raspberry/Bronx cheer!)... all in good josh, brother.

[Gregory]

Again, I was talking about far more than just failings in historical terms.
Thanks for elaborating, though. I get your position a bit better now. I remember this came up offhand some time ago when we were discussing Griffith (whom I've never been able to develop any deep appreciation for after having seen a few of his films, and not merely because of social/ideological issues) and it didn't get discussed any further, so I'm a little glad we came around to the matter eventually. I would probably agree that something has been lost as you suggest but I've usually seen this as inevitable beyond a certain point. I think some things might be gained in the process, but I dont know.
We'll likely never agree on all this, but nevertheless perhaps I should try taking a leaf from your book -- if I ever end up with this Cooper set, I'll try to watch York your way, which may be impossible as I'm aware it's Hawks. My negative reaction to escapism just comes from the fact that in general it's all too common -- it's the financial raison d'etre of the movie business -- and can be dangerous when combined with the propaganda functions of it, and other media. Plus there's already relatively little serious film criticism (apart from impenetrable, jargon-laden academic stuff) and what there is is under-appreciated. But that's probably enough from me on the subject.

[GringoTex]

True, a great many of his best films have these elements (Only Angels Have Wings, Red River, The Big Sky, Hatari!, and the Wayne trilogy of westerns).

You can add His Girl Friday (though different in that the woman is central to the team).

[zedz]

I say to comrade zedz (your screen name always gives me vertigo when I hear it in my head... what does it mean?) with all due respect that if one held the buffer of

stock characters, weak women, irony-free, folksy, hagiographic.

over every pre '60 genre film you'd be left with a few documentaries. Certainly the vast bulk of Ford/Wayne, Hawks in sum, the whole Mann catalog (his noirs are 100% amped up stereotypes), and just about every piece of war/western/gangster pic are inhabited by weak women and stereotypical characters with very little development.

What I meant by this is that the film's content was an awkward fit for Hawks specifically in those terms, because I think the major strengths of Hawks' best films are lively and surprising characterisations, including strong women working alongside men (just look at what he does with the potentially boilerplate Only Angels Have Wings), irony, cynicism and (in a special, Hollywood-friendly sense) psychological realism. And his sense of humour is far more hard-edged and urban than what we see in Sergeant York. I'm not demanding these things from other directors of the period (who have their own strengths).

To me, the film seems far better suited to somebody like John Ford (the strong women in Ford films are often mothers, for example), and he's a director who, on a good day, can deliver piety and sentiment with a conviction that takes your breath away. I don't see that kind of conviction in the direction of York (though it's there in Cooper's performance, which works like mad to sell the film), and something like the turkey-gobbling sniper scene just seems embarrassed and embarrassing to me.

That said, there are plenty of films from the period that are quite alien to 'contemporary' values / models, but which still work beautifully for me on their own terms (Now, Voyager is a recently viewed example that springs to mind; and Heaven Can Wait is another, contentious, example), and when you go back to the silent era, this sort of consideration is even more relevant. My problem with York is that, for me, it doesn't work on its own terms, not that it doesn't work on mine (whatever they are).

And then again there are films that work for me on completely gonzoid, unexpected terms, like Somewhere in the Night, which is a thriller with a ridiculous, convoluted (and ultimately nonsensical) plot and absurdly purple dialogue beyond the power of half the cast to sell, but for me it distills the dreamlike, Lynchian side of noir, boiling down to a series of more or less cryptic encounters between characters in or around doorways, and the endless echoing of a heady crash of symbols.

And sir z, I know you're not alone in despising SCHINDLER. But you don't like THIEF OF BAGDAD either so (raspberry/Bronx cheer!)... all in good josh, brother.

Hey, I don't like the other Thief of Bagdad either. Don't get me started!

[HerrSchreck]

It may be that the film stirs something deep inside of Americans, especially those beyond their thirties-- and revolting to non Americans, particularly in light of today's times. That is to say, Americans may be more predisposed to enjoy and be willing to enter the world of those characters... to hearken back to the time when there was more wide open space, more freedom in complete & total isolation from government ("Lord bless this food and help us to never depend on no man"), where the result may have been illiterate huckleberry hick backward folk, but who generally did the right thing in coming together with other Americans from vastly different, and alien, parts, to Do The Right Thing in times of wars which were good causes.

That's all this movie is about-- not the cinema, but an idea of what America can and did once seem to be about in ideal terms. And a desire to believe that America can and did produce-- and in fact found it's best in-- lanky innocuous old christian boys named Alvin York who didn't know what a train was, but who stepped up when asked and meshed with the armies of the sophisticated old world of europe... and proved themselves a thousandfold. It's a good thing to feel good about, even if for a moment while watching the film. York was indeed a pretty good man, could shoot the blackheads out your pores while you stood in Georgia and he sat on the pot in Tennessee, did indeed turn down all those offers, did indeed want to simply go back home and live his simple life. The film simply wants you to feel good about the old boy, and I think it succeeds marvellously. Many people loved the film when it came out and still enjoy it now.

If you think those characters are dumb stereotypes of mountain folk, you're wrong-- they're actually quite literate compared to some. The film presents them in a quite dignified, yet harmlessly fun and entertaining style. I thought the scenes with his mother quite nice.

[Scharphedin2]

There is little that I would be able to add to Schreck's appraisal of the film above. It seems to me that most of the differences between forum members, when it comes to this film has to do with the way different individuals view films differently. Although there sometimes appear to be a certain sense in which a serious member of the critical establishment shall forego the actual pleasure of viewing films in favor of passing impartial judgment, I will always uphold that (aside from a very small group of ultra-serious high art pictures) the prime reason that films are made, and viewed (and Sergeant York certainly belonging to this type of film), is for the joy and pleasure of it. Something very essential indeed has been lost, and nothing (that I can discern) really gained, if films can no longer be enjoyed on their own terms -- for the stories they tell, the times and places they can transport us to, the odd and different and fascinating people they can let us befriend for an hour or two. That there is learning and insights that can and will be had about all manner of the world's and life's important and less important issues through this joy of watching movies, well... that is the added beauty of it all.

I have a lot of respect for Davidhare's depth of experience and knowledge, and especially his understanding and appreciation of film form. Recently, in a different thread, David commented that, as time passes, the films that he finds it rewarding to go back to again and again are primarily those that display a perfection of form (sorry, if I misquote you David, I think that was the essence of it).

With Hawks, there is the prevalent idea that the recurring motifs of the "team" and/or "male love affairs" are intrinsic to his films, certainly to the best of them. His films are also noted for their masculinity, and I think it can be said that Hawks is a quintessential American director of his time, and a director who mastered action and timing better than just about anyone else. If I read David correctly, and some other posts above, the objection with a film like Sergeant York is that on several points Hawks failed to mold the material into an essentially Hawksian film. I can see these defects, if defects they are, in York. However, this is also where I personally have a difficult time with the auteur-oriented theories. I feel that it is too "scientific" an approach to film, and it seems to me overly reductive. The idea of viewing a body of work by an artist, and finding the commonalities between the individual works, and sketching a picture of the director's style and general worldview from these recurring themes and elements makes complete sense to me, but to turn around and use this sketch to disqualify individual works within the oeuvre based on their lack of correspondence with this ideal picture of the director's work does not really make sense to me.

(I am ready to accept that this perception could change over time with increased experience and knowledge, just as it is clear that Davidhare's sensitivity to form, and what it is that makes a film great, is something that he has developed over many years of viewing and re-viewing films. However, I also think there is room to challenge these ideas and theories; certainly in this case I have a strong feeling that the life of the film is being sacrificed for the purpose of dissecton.)

[tryavna]

If you think those characters are dumb stereotypes of mountain folk, you're wrong-- they're actually quite literate compared to some. The film presents them in a quite dignified, yet harmlessly fun and entertaining style.

Yes, this was one of the points I was trying to make in my previous post. The lack of patronization on the part of the filmmakers is what's so amazing -- especially when you stop to compare this to all those Ma and Pa Kettle movies that were actually made shortly after this film. Perhaps this lack of patronization is the major contribution Hawks made to the film, since I agree that he doesn't explore his usual themes here. (Of course, the fact that it is an a-typical Hawks film is one of the reasons I find it interesting. As some of you know, I tend to find those films that confound auteurist readings particularly interesting -- even if they're problematic.)

Schreck's suggestion that York works on a sort of national-subconscious level is interesting. I'm not sure how you'd prove that, but it strikes me as a distinct possibility (based on what I wrote earlier about my mother's love for it). I wonder what other films might serve as the nearest points of comparison?

PS: What do people who dislike York think of Hawks' Air Force? That's a movie that is far more Hawks-ian (celebrating the "team," etc.). But it's also a propaganda/war film that strikes me as far more embarrassing in its cultural politics than York, especially lines like "Fried Jap going down!" and "Gentlemen, I've studied all the wars of history, and I've never encountered such duplicity!"

[Gregory]

What do people who dislike York think of Hawks' Air Force? That's a movie that is far more Hawks-ian (celebrating the "team," etc.). But it's also a propaganda/war film that strikes me as far more embarrassing in its cultural politics than York, especially lines like "Fried Jap going down!" and "Gentlemen, I've studied all the wars of history, and I've never encountered such duplicity!"

I haven't seen Air Force recently enough (or enough times) to feel really comfortable commenting on it, but it is one I'd definitely like to see again. As you point out, the Hawksian group element is a clue that there are interesting things at work in the film, though I hesitate to call it fitting a mold because I think there are lots of subtle differences among the groups in Hawks' films. Anyway, it's certainly a film worth watching, and I certainly wouldn't think of completely dismissing the film because of racist dialogue. (And that shouldn't come as a surprise to anyone, if the points I made earlier have been understood at all.)
It didn't impress me as being among Hawks' very best work, but it's impressive that he was able to execute it as well has he did because of the conditions under which it was made. There were serious problems with Dudley Nichols' script that Hawks tried to cope with even while rushing to get the film in on schedule, Additionally, he was shooting only one take of each shot a lot of the time in order to save film for Warner Bros. so the final result is more impressive taking these kinds of things into account.

[colinr0380]

That's all this movie is about-- not the cinema, but an idea of what America can and did once seem to be about in ideal terms. And a desire to believe that America can and did produce-- and in fact found it's best in-- lanky innocuous old christian boys named Alvin York who didn't know what a train was, but who stepped up when asked and meshed with the armies of the sophisticated old world of europe... and proved themselves a thousandfold. It's a good thing to feel good about, even if for a moment while watching the film.

Sorry this is off topic a bit, but that would seem to describe Audie Murphy perfectly. War hero and movie star!

[domino harvey]

So I recently picked this up and worked my way through the set as I've become very interested in Cooper lately. Aside from the marvelous Sgt York-- which I agree with the minority, it's one of Hawks' best!-- the next brightest spot was the film I figured would be the worst: the Wreck of the Mary Deare, a very tense little suspense film with a fantastic opening 45 minutes set on an abandoned sinking cargo ship that plays without music and is quite expertly edited. Though it devolves into a competent courtroom thriller, the best moments are those on the water, and there's also the worlds smuggest performance by Richard Harris. It's basically the best kind of pleasant surprise that can come out of one of these boxes-- a great little title that you'd never seek out on your own. As for the Fountainhead... maybe if I didn't understand English, I'd love it. Springfield Rifle should have been better considering how wonderfully twist-heavy it is, but I found DeToth's direction clumsy and often confusing. Dallas didn't even register.

[hearthesilence]

It was suggested that the making of Sergeant York is more interesting than the film itself, and after stumbling on this article by Todd McCarthy, I can't say they're wrong. In a lot of ways, the best parts of Clint Eastwood's Flags of Our Fathers addresses the most compelling aspects of that story (the making of the film that is).