A RARE NOIR IS GOOD TO FIND—INDEX

If attendance at last Fall's series "The French Had A Name For It" is any indication, it's likely that "A Rare Noir Is Good To Find"—kicking off tomorrow evening at the Roxie Theatre in San Francisco (March 19-23, 2015)—will be equally as popular and one might be well-advised to purchase a festival pass (a mere $50 for 15 films over 5 days) to insure entry.

As stated in their program notes: "ALL the world was noir in the years following World War II. [¶] Sure, there were other film genres hard at work competing for ticket sales; but it's interesting to note that as noir's box office clout began to slide in America, it began to flourish elsewhere. (Our schedule for the first edition of A Rare Noir Is Good To Find confirms that—fourteen of the fifteen films in the program date from after 1955, and eight from after 1960.) [¶] Pioneering noir historian Spencer Selby has called this phenomenon 'the world-wide noir tradition.' The prolific nature of it is truly astonishing, and we are just beginning to scratch the surface of the dark visions that came to life with such vivid bleakness on all the continents of the world. [¶] Roxie audiences who were mesmerized last November by the case we made for the 'undiscovered continent' of French noir will now have the opportunity to search vistas leading us to a global 'virus' that spread its message of deep skepticism about human nature and explored the fissures in class and gender relations that were left stubbornly untransformed in the aftermath of war."

Here at The Evening Class, I've been indulging write-ups on the series' double-bills over the past few weeks, and group them here for easy reference.

Thursday, March 19, 2015 / Vive La France
Un Condamné À Mort S'est Échappé (A Man Escaped, 1956) / Retour De Manivelle (There's Always A Price Tag, 1957)

Friday, March 20, 2015 / Perilous Love
Tulipunainen kyyhkynen (The Scarlet Dove, 1961) / Ye Mei Gui Zhi Lian (The Wild, Wild Rose, 1960)

Saturday, March 21, 2015 / Japon Negro [Matinee]
Underworld Beauty (Ankokugai no bijo, 1958) / Intimidation (Aru kyôhaku, 1960) / Pale Flower (Kawaita hana, 1964)

Saturday, March 21, 2015 / Walk On the Wild Side
Il Rossetto (Lipstick, 1960) / Bundfald (Dregs / Sin Alley, 1957)

Of Related Interest

Meredith Brody, Indiewire, "San Francisco Loves Its Noir: From Noir City to the Roxie"

Mike Dub, E Street Film Society, Reviews of Assault on the Pay Train, The Scarlet Dove, and Retour de Manivelle

Daniel Barnes, E Street Film Society, Reviews of Japon Negro Triple-bill

G. Allen Johnson, San Francisco Chronicle, "Roxie Theatre International noir series has undiscovered gems"

Pam Grady surveys the line-up at EatDrinkFilms

 

BLANCHE DUBOIS IN PURGATORY (2014)

Have you ever wondered what happened to Blanche DuBois after she accepted the kindness of strangers and allowed that mild-mannered doctor to lead her off to the looney bin? Comparatively, have you ever wondered what happened to Christianity and how it, too, was led off on an unassuming arm to be made a mockery of on the political pulpit? Some polls indicate that, increasingly, young people no longer hold stock in the Christian faith and its promise of a heavenly afterlife as they watch tele-evangelists and right wing nut jobs whitewash hate and call it scripture, shaking their fist vehemently (if dangerously) at the separation of church and state, as if equally intent at ending the separation between life and death. The afterlife is a consummation devoutly to be wished just to be done with these mediated hypocrites, if one even thinks about the afterlife anymore. Does anyone think about the afterlife anymore? Hell seems hardly a deterrent if Heaven is going to be filled with these assholes: that's what the Christian message has been reduced to.

Mike Black's Blanche DuBois in Purgatory (2014) is self-identified as a comedy somewhere between life and death and comes across as something of a morality play for a frustrated 21st century that questions our presumption of the afterlife and our cultural (and personal) expectations of what comes after. Inversely, it even questions the afterlife's presumption on us as individuals, like the questionable necessity of a doctor's receptionist requiring we fill out forms while waiting for an appointment. Instead, we're given a waylay station, a kind of hovering bardo state, to ask a single question before vanishing altogether. Amerindian shamans might call it a dance before death. Existentialists might call it a moment of defiant reckoning in an amoral universe. But Mike Black sees it as the welcome opportunity to conjure up the language of Tennessee Williams on a bare stage with stark lighting giving three consummate actors the chance to hit their marks and soliloquize against the dark advance of oblivion.

And make no bones about it: Blanche DuBois in Purgatory is all about language, which some believe is the best thing mankind's got, like plumage to the bird, or a shiny pelt to an animal. Mike Black's burnished script is not for short-attention spans. It's a literary, stagestruck chamber piece that elicits action within the wry, mellifluous momentum of its own dialogue. Stage direction is near non-existent. In other words, it's difficult, but rewarding if you allow it to be. It's a maverick piece of parenthetical irony completely out of step with our contemporary moment and, thus, will probably be unappreciated, disregarded, dismissed as nostalgic, and set aside for something either more sexy or explosive, which is a shame because it has more going for it in 56 minutes than most showrunners can conjure for a whole season. If you care to listen.

Fans of Matthew Martin who are accustomed to watching him perform impersonations of Bette Davis or Susan Hayward in drag are going to be surprised to see him playing it straight, so to speak, though in tap shoes and tails, perplexed and resistant to the situation in which he finds himself. Martin has ineluctable presence and one only wishes he had more opportunity to flex his chops as he's able to evidence in this vehicle.

Nancy French, likewise, elicits a restrained characterization of Blanche DuBois that's affecting and tender for being more sweet and mannered than exaggerated. As a dead woman she still favors flattery and recognizes how important a dalliance can be to negotiate extinction.

Seton Brown spars with them both as the put-upon and unkempt functionary who facilitates their moment before they're extinguished once and for all, quintessentially overworked and no doubt unfairly compensated, and at irritated odds with the signature themes that announce new arrivals.

This staged cinematic experiment has all the brief pleasure of an absorbing short story and is much like what you would picture in your own mind while reading; a kind of readers theater of the mind, but captured on film by Carole Summers and Lisa Andreini. And it's available at no cost in its entirety on YouTube (though donations are gladly accepted at the film's production site to offset costs). Take a calm moment, fix a cup of hot tea, and pleasure in the well-turned phrases of this dark comedy somewhere between life and death. What will your final question be?

 

MING STUDIOS: A MAN OF LETTERS—The Evening Class Interview With Noel B. Weber

If you've not yet stopped by Ming Studios to take a look at their current exhibit "A Man of Letters"—Ming's retrospective showcase of Master Sign Painter, Noel B. Weber—then you can't really call yourself a self-respecting Boisean and you're not doing your part to ensure that Ming Studios continues to flourish as Boise's cutting edge art space. The good news is you still have some time to redeem yourself. "A Man of Letters" continues through March 28, 2015, and is a must-see experience for anyone interested in the art and history of Boise, Idaho, the aesthetics of civic branding, and the inspirational (if not necessary) partnership of tradition and innovation.

Jason Morales, the founder and executive director of Ming Studios, works at Microsoft as a specialist on the US Education team. He founded Ming Studios less than a year ago in May 2014 with the inaugural exhibit "Cornucopia" introducing the work of Berlin artist Uli Westphal to Boise audiences while collaborating at the same time with The Snake River Alliance Seed Packet Project to present original work from local artists. Straightaway, his vision to create a conduit of influence between international and regional artists afforded an opportunity to explore the conflict between the marketing strategies of industrial food production and local efforts to promote sustainable biodiversity. Ming Studios then followed through with a solo installation piece by internationally-known muralist Axel Void, who set his eye on two local girls to pursue his practiced themes of the extraordinary sifted from the seemingly mediocre. Morales and his associate program director Kristen Cooper have supplemented their exhibitions with special one-off events such as a First Thursday program of the short films of Dutch artist Katarina Zdjelar (the first true art films I've seen in Boise), a dance performance by Project Flux, and an acoustic concert by local music acts With Child and Bijoux (formerly, Grandma Kelsey). Ming Studios hopes to bring international artists to Idaho via residencies, thereby introducing fresh influences and opportunities for Boise-based artists. He supercedes regional compulsions, offsets implosion with expansion, to suggest a necessary cross-pollination from out-of-state, if not out-of-country, to strengthen Idaho's artistic presence and to move Boise further towards international profile. His vision is thrillingly urban and global. It's exactly what Boise needs to update its civic brand.

When I first entered Ming Studios last May, I was intrigued in its having been incorporated into the corner space of Classic Design Studio who almost single-handedly have branded downtown Boise with signage, gilded glass, mural work, and architectural elements. The face of the city is their's. Although state-of-the-art in production techniques, they represent what is successful and traditional in Boise. In 1989, they moved into their studio space on the corner of South 6th and West Myrtle, which was once occupied by the Ming Detail Shop for nearly 30 years. It was where you would bring your car to have a clear coat applied. Their motto was "Ming, never wax again." They liked the name and its four letters and were aware that—among the Chinese—the Ming Dynasty was one of the brightest dynasties of their history; an era when quality craftsmanship was at its height. So they retained the name because they felt it fit. Boise Art Glass used to be in the front space before they moved to their new location. Without even advertising, four or five other businesses enquired after the space but Noel Weber, Jr.—who had taken over the property management from his dad—decided on a collaboration with Jason Morales and supervised the transition. They decided his vision was more in line with what Classic Design Studio had accomplished and were continuing to do: i.e., creating the face of Boise. Their only requirement was that Jason retain the Ming name. Both Creative Design Studios and Ming Studios are proud of their ongoing unique partnership.

I'm grateful to Jason Morales for introducing me to Noel Weber and for facilitating my recent conversation with him. I extend further thanks for his allowing me to incorporate information from the exhibition's flyer and promotional postcard. But most of all I thank Noel Weber himself and his son Noel, Jr. When I arrived to talk to him, Weber's hand was casually poised on a mahlstick, comfortably concentrating, as he painted by brush with his other hand. He explained that the mahlstick steadies his hand while he's painting and keeps it off the surface of what he's working on so that he doesn't smear the paint and ruin his patterns. Some people work hand over hand, he offered, while others work with their pinky.

* * *

Mentorship is the grace note of Noel Weber's artistic narrative. After having learned from others for so many years, he now finds himself in the position of being a mentor to those rising up through the ranks. It has been one of the most satisfying elements of his career to learn, develop, and now share the processes and techniques of his craft with other artisans. His studios have turned out an amazing crop of talented designers and craftsmen, of which he couldn't be more proud.

As a kid growing up in Rogers Park during the 1960s, Weber's earliest inspiration and his first opportunity for mentorship came during high school watching Chicago sign painter John Hunt hand letter school buses. He became fascinated and would sit and watch him work every day after school. "The graceful movement of his brush," Weber recalled, "I was just mesmerized." Hunt's kindness and encouragement helped spark his love for letters and design.

I asked if he could recall what it was that excited him? What was the nature of his aesthetic arrest? Was he already artistically inclined? Not really, he answered, though he was always doodling and drawing things. He probably did have good art skills, but had no training whatsoever, as nothing was offered by way of art classes where he went to school. But to see somebody put a brush in his hand to deliver a message and actually deliver a beautiful graphic impressed him. Even moreso, he was really impressed with how independent Hunt was.

"He'd say, 'Well, I'll be back tomorrow' and then wouldn't show up for two days. It wasn't because he was out goofing off somewhere. It was because he was so busy and he just couldn't get back to that job. When he came back, he'd always do a flawless job."

After high school Weber was drafted and served 14 months in Vietnam where he got his first experience as a sign painter sloping serial numbers onto the sides of helicopters and painting company identities. His hand shot up when his platoon commander asked if anybody had any artistic ability (though he's the first to admit his first letters "were pretty hideous"). Notwithstanding, the assignment got him out of being the door gunner on a helicopter.

After his tour of duty, Weber returned home and met up with John Hunt to tell him that he had painted some signs in Viet Nam. Hunt asked him, "Well, what are you going to do?" Weber told him he'd decided to take advantage of the G.I. Bill to attend Chicago's Institute of Lettering and Design, where he studied for two years. After, he met up with Hunt again who said, "Let me introduce you to the union business agent." They started him out as a third-year apprentice, crediting him for his two years of school, which was great. He worked in the suburbs for a while before deciding to move to Denver.

"Denver in the 1970s was my Paris," Weber recalled. He became one of the founding members of the "Denver 7", the precursors of the Letterheads: a group of young designers disenchanted by their commercial prospects and invested in bringing back the art of their craft. They felt their trade was in decline and committed themselves to becoming the "keepers of the craft." In retrospect, Weber realizes that it wasn't so much that their trade was in decline as it was simply at a lull, but their impatience and disillusionment proved beneficial.

"We were finding all these old books with beautiful, spectacular sign work in them and we all knew that was what we wanted to do. We didn't want to just paint real estate signs. We wanted to do beautiful art because at one time signage was an art form. We were looking around for the old guys to learn from, but couldn't find them. So we started teaching ourselves."

The Letterheads immersed themselves in the study of hand painted signs, gold leaf lettering, and other classic techniques and would share what they discovered at weekly meetings. From the original seven—Rick Flores, John Frazier, Bob Mitchell, Mark Oatis, Mike Rielly, Earl Vehill, Mike Author, Joe Tedesco, Jim Schultz and Noel Weber—the Letterheads have since grown into an international organization with more than 40,000 members. Their 40th Letterheads reunion is scheduled for next September at Cincinnati's American Sign Museum. One of the subjects that will be approached at that meeting will be the transition to water-based paints to minimize health and environmental risks. Over the years lead has been slowly removed from the paints they use. "Consequently, they don't work as well," Weber grinned, but assured me they always use caution. The younger set, especially, often use respirators and everyone avoids getting the paint on their skin.

Another term that came out of the Denver experience was "walldog", and—as someone who has extensively studied public mural art, particularly by way of its urban Chicano inflection—I was surprised to have never heard the term before.

"Walldog is a sign painter's term," Weber explained, "to describe the hard work of painting on a wall. Years ago, a walldog was a guy who would be on a wall for one or two days, using block and tackle, old rope and staging, and it was really physical. It wasn't the most glamorous type of work, but it was fun work. I really like painting walls today but I wouldn't want to do it on a daily basis."

In 1979, Weber and his wife Lucy moved to Boise. They didn't really have a long-range plan—they just wanted to make a living—but they were drawn to Boise because the city still had some attractive old buildings and they wanted to design signage to complement them. "We weren't settlers here," Weber explained, "we were pioneers." The business began in their garage / home studio and consisted mostly of hand-painted signs and gilded windows. Nothing was yet automated and most of the work was done by Weber himself with some assistance from his wife and kids. A 1946 Chevy panel truck with its distinctive hand-lettered signage was some of the company's best advertising.

Their first big break came in the 1980s creating signage for over 30 small businesses in Boise's newly-remodeled Eighth Street Marketplace. Weber's western flair of lettering—which had not been so popular in Chicago (and might have been partially responsible for why he left the Windy City to look for work elsewhere)—fit Boise perfectly. He explained that a sign must work commercially first of all, but that there's no reason why it can't also be artistic and aesthetic. Their signage is likewise pedestrian-oriented, meant to be appreciated by passers-by who aren't insulted by it or overwhelmed by something flashing or out-of-scale. This ties in to my own love for public art and I appreciate that Weber has melded commercial necessity to pedestrian, public art. Around the same time, Weber began teaching gold-leaf workshops for which he became well-known.

When Steve Jobs and Apple Computers released the first home computer in January 1984, it featured a graphic user interface rather than a command-prompt interface, and had a devastating effect on his trade, but only momentarily. Though anyone without any training whatsoever could type letters into a computer and print them out on vinyl quickly and cheaply, it didn't take long to recognize the inferior product. The Letterheads learned to bridge the technology. Classic Design Studios relocated to their current space in 1989 and had more room to develop services. In 1997, they added a CNC (Computer-Numeric-Controlled) router that allowed complex three-dimensional designs to be achieved more quickly and efficiently than hand-carving. But, even then, the detail work was always done by hand.

"There's nothing like having a brush in your hand," Weber insists. "I can see the difference, and even hear the difference when that brush hits the surface and I'm pulling a stroke. That feels good."

Having been taught to believe that quality craftsmanship can be recognized as the result of the soul of the craftsman whorling out of the fingertips into whatever's being worked upon, Weber's comment resonated with me. He noted as well that all good design begins with the pencil.

"That's one of the things we really like here. When we design something, we know we can build it. From the point we start designing, we know it will be something we can make. When I draw a letter, I can paint it, I can produce it. I know that it's going to read and fill a need. When I draw a sign, I try to draw it so that it says a statement and delivers a message without even reading it."

That led me to ask about how he designs fonts and their marketability? Weber answered that they have set up their own store to that effect. He used to be on the font site Letterhead Fonts but got kicked off by the owner, allegedly for "emotional troubles", so they started Artist Fonts; but, admittedly, the online site has not been going as strongly as he would like, so they're hoping to set up their own store on-site and sell their designs themselves. At least that's what he keeps telling himself as his time becomes more and more preoccupied.

They're also doing workshops, which are filling up rapidly. Case in point, their upcoming three-day gilding workshop in May—which he's teaching with ornamental glass artist David Smith (visiting from Torquay, England)—has only a few slots left. He concurs this is a high-end professional workshop, pricier than the average layman can afford. His glue-chip glass workshop coming up in April is already full and will be the first time he's teaching that class. Classic Design Studio has further courses coming up: a design workshop in July, and a porcelain enamel workshop in October. The workshops are instrumental in passing on skills and techniques he's acquired over the years and a great way to consolidate the letterhead community. Although Classic Design Studio has not done any work in San Francisco proper, Andrew Lawrence of Gentleman Scholar Signs came up to study with them. And it was at one of his workshops that he forged a relationship with a craftsman from Disney Imagineering that has resulted in several major Disney contracts for the company from Southern California to Shanghai.

"We've done three main projects with them," Weber offered. "We did a project where we were asked to design signage for Adventureland. They wanted it to look like it did when Walt was living in California and just starting Disneyland, so it was all '30s and '40s design and its conception of the future. We designed the signage and they sent it back to us for fabrication. We fabricated some blade signs and 70+ windows. We did all that work here. Last year, we designed a bunch of stuff for their new theme park in Shanghai. I'm also working on a technical alphabet"—Weber gestures to works-in-progress on the walls—"so that they can call out different gilding techniques on glass."

I was curious whether Classic Design Studio had set up any classes through BSU but he said no, even though they had reached out to them in the past. They do offer tours to high school students and assistance on student projects. For example, there's a young woman working on a glass project who asked to use their kilns.

Photo: Michael Guillén.

Otherwise, visiting Ming Studios is a great chance for people to take a look at what the studios are all about. I relayed my excitement when I toured their studios for the first time and found the petrified potato, which I photographed and have been using as my Facebook banner. Noel, Jr. relayed that the petrified potato was one of their first ambitious product ideas that they came up with 9-10 years ago. It was an idea they'd had since they were kids, right after pet rocks were the rage. Weber explained he was trying to teach his boys to be entrepreneurs so he encouraged the petrified potato project to help them raise money. He'd take them down to the river where there was an unlimited resource of rocks. He ended up with a 250 gallon drum full of rocks. But at that time they were hand-cutting all the stencil and it was really laborious. To this day, it's a family joke.

Another product idea was a limited edition of the sesquicentennial thermometer, which sold well. "Those are ideas you do just because you can." When I asked if he sold any of his original sketches, he said they plan to put a book together. Inspired by seeing them all on the wall in the exhibit.

Weber's influence on the national scene underscores his stature as a local treasure. The decade started off with a bang when Classic Design Studio organized "Boise & Beyond", the 25th silver anniversary of the Letterheads, hosting 350 Letterheads who converged on Boise for their annual conference in July 2000. Along with co-organizers Steve and Margaret Marlatt of Advanced Sign & Design, they rented the Centre on the Grove for 26 art and design workshops. During their visit, Letterhead volunteers painted the impressive murals that still adorn three downtown buildings—the Basque Center, the Adelmann Building, and Hannafin's.

The Basque Mural, Weber advised, was painted inside the convention center. Lead muralist, Bill Hueg, designed the mural and the Yankee's Machine Shop donated the panels. Weber, and more than 25 volunteers, worked for three days to complete the project. The mural contains images central to Basque culture.

The Stearns motor car mural was painted on-site at the Adelmann in 120º weather. Some controversy exists about whether or not the Letterheads should have painted over the original ghost sign advertising Stearns Motor Car Auto Repair and, unfortunately, the owner of the building has not taken care of it and, consequently, the building's pagoda turret was leaking water for years and it got in behind the paint and has broken it down. One of these days they'll have to re-do it and Weber hopes he'll still be in good enough shape to help.

Although urban renewal is often criticized for ruining significant historical architecture—the Stearns Motor Car mural being a case in point—even the Boise Architecture Project has conceded that in some cases urban renewal has helped to make a rather ordinary façade more appealing and unique, adding character to otherwise lifeless walls. Such has certainly been the case with Hannifans Cigar Shop.

* * *

Weber will guide a virtual tour of Downtown Boise at Ming Studios on Friday, March 20, at 6:30PM, sharing photos and the historic context of his work over the last 35 years. Participants will have an opportunity to reflect upon Boise's changing landscape and to inquire about the menagerie of establishments and people who have grown with it.

Of related interest: check out Gina Sinisi's 2007 profile "A Finely Tuned Anarchy: Classic Design Studio creates the signs of our times" for the Boise Weekly, which details several downtown projects. Also KTVB's recent television spot in conjunction with the exhibition. To see Weber in action designing the invitation to his upcoming glass gilding workshop, check out the photo spread at Bēhance Gallery's website.

A RARE NOIR IS GOOD TO FIND—Il Rossetto (Lipstick, 1960) / Bundfald (Dregs / Sin Alley, 1957)

Acknowledging that "youthful misjudgment can lead to transgression and tragedy", Donald Malcolm identifies the brutal loss of innocence as a presiding theme of noir and offers two narratives from Italy and Denmark to bluntly demonstrate same.

First up is Il Rossetto (Lipstick, 1960) with Laura Vivaldi as Silvana, a 14-year-old school girl hopelessly infatuated with her neighbor Gino, and who can blame her? Played by a youthful Pierre Brice (think Alain Delon mixed with Rock Hudson) a mere three years before his successful run at ethnic masquerade portraying German author Karl May's fictional Mescalero Apache chief Winnetou (from 1962 to 1968 he acted in a total of 11 West German westerns adapted from May's novels, alongside Lex Barker (7 movies), Stewart Granger (3 movies) and Rod Cameron (1 movie) as the white heroes).

Vivaldi's career, on the other hand, entailed one more film and then she vanished; but, not without leaving behind this affecting performance to her credit. For his first feature, Damiano Damiani elicited an uncompromising critique of adult supervision on the skids by showing how Silvana mimics her mother's desperations to a fault, using adolescent wiles—and a provocative tube of lipstick—to secure the affections of Gino, who is engaged to wed another. Her dalliance with Gino is at turns petulant, sensual and suspenseful as she flirts with a worldly-wise full-blooded male who has ambitions of his own, creating—as Malcolm puts it—"a near-infinity of havoc for everyone", including a police investigator played by Divorce, Italian Style director Pietro Germi (in a reprise of his noted performance as an inspector in The Facts of Murder).

The dangers of adolescent desire are treated maturely and respectfully. The "modern" young girls of Italy are shown to have sex on their minds as they clock how long lovers kiss in the park, and challenge each other towards experience. Gino's prowess as a lover is suggested though never shown. He and his lover leave their rented bedroom smiling and satiated, and one can only relate to Silvana's fevered fantasies.

Anton (Ib Mossin) is the next innocent devastated by experience in Palle Kjaerrulff-Schmidt's debut feature Bundfald (Sin Alley, 1957). Bored with life in his home town and craving opportunity, the naïve Anton arrives in Copenhagen and is swiftly manipulated by lowlifes Kaj and Egon into using his sleek youthful looks to bait and blackmail elderly homosexuals for quick money. Sin Alley is frank in its depiction of the circumscribed lives available to gay men at the time—where fantasies of recruitment and a fascination with trade put men in jeopardy and danger, with legal repercussions—but does so with less judgment than one might expect. In fact, the three gay targets in this story are each unique personalities and are all represented sympathetically. Auntie, the owner of the sex bar where Anton and his crew hang out to pick up men, is the only gay character among the ensemble who has any effeminate characteristics whatsoever. The others are coded as educated, affluent and effete, or—if young—well-dressed and just plain pretty. It's the ringleader Kaj (Bent Christensen) who's painted as abusive, loathesome and criminal, misguiding Anton (who the film subtly criticizes for being so readily exploited; he becomes accustomed to his amoral line of work as soon as money starts passing hands).

With its admirable treatment of a difficult subject decades ahead of its time (homophobia was rampant in Europe during the film's production) and its relatively sympathetic portraits of gay men victimized by straight criminals, I was much surprised to not find Sin Alley listed in any of the anthologies of queer film on my book shelves, making it a true find for queer cinephilia. Perhaps it escaped censure as part of a sub-genre of youth-oriented films in Scandanavia at the time, ostensibly focusing on the social issue of widespread youth unemployment? It earned the national Danish Bodil Award for Best Picture in 1957 for Kjaerrulff-Schmidt and his co-director Robert Saaskin. Kjaerrulff-Schmidt went on to play a significant role in the Danish New Wave of the 1960s. Equally surprising is that the only mention I could find on the film was as a noir vehicle in Spencer Selby's The Woldwide Film Noir Tradition and, more recently, in his Historical Dictionary of Scandanavian Cinema (2012:236).

Between Lipstick and Sin Alley, the Roxie provides an entertaining evening of good kids gone bad.

THROWBACK THURSDAY—The Greencine Interview With Herschell Gordon Lewis

(Originally published on the Greencine website, February 2007.)

These days Herschell Gordon Lewis has made a pretty penny for himself as a direct communicator—one might say a "shining light"—in the sophisticated world of general advertising and direct marketing. He is without peer. Nobody has written more books (20+ and counting). Nobody has written more articles (he writes monthly columns for a number of trade journals). Certainly nobody is more respected.

As former chairman of Communicomp, a full-service direct marketing agency with clients throughout the world, now renamed as a division of the advertising holding company Interpublic, Herschell Gordon Lewis now heads Lewis Enterprises, through which he writes and consults individually. Some of his clients include Barnes & Noble, Lens Express, and CNA Insurance. He is arguably the best-known direct response writer and consultant in the United States, with a background that includes more than 20 years as adjunct lecturer to graduate classes in Mass Communications at Roosevelt University, Chicago.

Incidentally—though hardly—Lewis is also the Godfather of Gore. Ever respectful of his key role in the vanguard of exploitation cinema in the '60s, he embraces his past with vigor and enthusiastically spoke with me by phone about film projects past and future.

* * *

Michael Guillén: I appreciate your taking the time to wander down memory lane with me a little bit.

Herschell Gordon Lewis: More like stagger….

Guillén: First and foremost, I want to be clear that I'm aware that your current genius is in direct marketing, but I do appreciate that—as you say—you're willing to "stagger" down memory lane with me today. I was wondering if you have exchanged any meaningful glances with motel sphinxes lately?

Lewis: [Laughs.] The Suez Motel, sadly, was torn down two years ago so the little sphinx there is long gone. Somebody graciously—I think!—sent me some pieces of cement from the Suez Motel. Now what am I supposed to do which a chunk of cement from an ex-motel?

Guillén: You could probably get good money for it on EBay!

Lewis: It's probably floating down some river somewhere or sitting at the bottom. I'm not sure what your question means. Do you mean am I currently at anything or what?

Guillén: I was just joking. No filmmaker has probably attracted more alliterative appellatives than you. You're the Guru of Gore, the Godfather of Gore, the Dean of Direct Marketing, and so on and so forth. Are there any particular nicknames that you like?

Lewis: Well, I'm usually referred to as "Hey, You!" [Laughs.] That's a strange question. People have asked me whether I object to being called the Godfather of Gore. No, I don't! Good heavens. I don't want it on my epitaph but I certainly don't object to it being there.

Guillén: I love something you said in an interview with John Wisniewski for Bright Lights Film Journal: "I see filmmaking as a business and pity anyone who regards it as an artform and spends money based on that immature philosophy." Clearly, your psychological motivations for filming these gore fantasies was the box office, where you did much better than anyone might have expected at the time. Though you were aiming for the immediate payoff, did you ever imagine your films would achieve the cult status they have achieved? Or the influence they've had on the horror genre itself?

Lewis: No. If I had known that, I might have spent more time making them. But, you see, that's the chimera; that's the dilemma on whose horns I might have been impaled. If I had spent more money making them, then chances are that I would not have made as many as I did, and whether or not the additional money poured into it would have reflected itself in additional interest, either by gorehounds seeing them in movie theaters or by the critics attacking them—which has always been a very nice thing to have happen—that's questionable. To me the concept was simply one of trying to make the kind of motion picture that someone would want to see and that some theater might show. You see, that's part of it too.

One reason that today we have so much stuff, the things that are shot on digital that are being sent directly to video, is that these pieces are made on an ego basis rather than on a business-like basis. Of course I've become a firm believer in serendipity. I found a niche that had not been occupied. I jumped into that niche with both feet and yet with great caution because what if I had made a movie of this type and nobody ever would play it? Then this would be another movie at the time—and there were plenty of them—that would be sitting rotting away in some film laboratory vault waiting for somebody to pay for it. That was a risk I didn't care to take. So, obviously, the combination of trying to make a movie no one had made before and trying to make a movie that would minimize the risk—those two things were not at all at odds in my mind.

My opinion is firm that no one has ever walked out of a movie because of a ragged pan. People have walked out of movies or sent them back to Netflix after looking at 10 seconds of them, saying "This is pretty doggone dull; I don't want to see any more of this." Word of mouth can break you in half or word of mouth can make you a giant. It depends on the entertainment value. It doesn't depend on the critics saying, "Gee. Look at the miserable level of acting in this movie."

Guillén: I'm fascinated that you're in a position to criticize auteurship as well as to criticize those who have followed you thinking making a low-budget movie guarantees anything. You have said that auteurship damages communication. Can you expand on what you mean by that?

Lewis: The difference between auteurship and showmanship, in my opinion, is light years because it's the difference between making a movie for yourself or making a movie for people you've never heard of and who have never heard of you before. I see this all the time. I see people who don't make movies, they give birth, and that their words are inviolate. Not at all. That simply is not my position and everyone is obviously free to criticize—and certainly I've been criticized, probably more than anybody else, even comparatively with Ed Wood, who I consider something of an auteur—not because of the movie but the intention behind it. The intention behind what one produces, whether it's a movie or a book, is not necessarily dependent on what the individual who creates it wants to say about it.

Guillén: Since marketing a target audience is your genius, can you speak some about the trailers and gimmicks you used to promote your films? I understand you passed out barf bags for your Blood Feast (1963) audiences?

Lewis: Barf bags. We had ambulances sitting outside the theater. On the barf bags we printed: "You may need this when you see Blood Feast." What was funny was we also had paperback books, which we passed out to theater owners at theater owner conventions and they would look and say, "What's this? Who are these people?" John Waters told me last week—I happened to be in Baltimore on another matter and we had a very pleasant reunion getting together—that he had tracked down the original Blood Feast paperback book!

My point would be that, if you live long enough, you become legitimate. Some of the comments that I hear today are totally out of sync with the comments I heard when we first made these movies. At the time, I suppose I was regarded as an outlaw in the movie business. "Who is this screwball who isn't even in California? And who's grinding out this stuff like so much hamburger?" Which is fairly apt, I guess, for that kind of movie. But it reached a point at which other producers were sending me their films to do the campaigns and I felt that was, perhaps, in showbiz the ultimate compliment; that somebody else would say, "Hey. You know how to campaign a picture."

Guillén: What redeems your exploitive gore films—if redemption is even necessary—is their abiding sense of humor. Can you speak some about the strategic blend of horror and humor?

Lewis: I can, and I'd be delighted to because—if we get to make Grim's Fairy Tales, and I've been in negotiation for months and months with somebody to produce this thing—it is in my opinion, at least for the time being, the ultimate blend between gore and humor. You see, we've come through future shock and rocketed out the other end of it. The day of just raw—what should I call it?—bloodletting is about to go into eclipse. We have movies that are unrelentingly unpleasant. For my stuff, I want the audience to sit there and realize that we didn't take any of it seriously and that they don't take any of it seriously.

I recall when I first made a movie called The Gore Gore Girls (1972), which was—I felt at the time (which shows how cloudy the crystal ball can be)—I felt it would be my last movie. I opened the spigot all the way. I had some things in there that I couldn't imagine anyone taking seriously. Well, as it turned out—and I'll make a sweeping, generic statement—anyone under age 40 thought it was hilarious; anyone over age 55 thought it was impossible, that I should be arrested, that I had spent my life in a Georgia chain gang, or whatever. That was the gap that existed then.

Today the people who were 40 then are now on MediCare and another generation has come up behind them. I will occasionally be invited to a horror film festival and the demographic there is really surprising because the average individual who attends these horror conventions was not alive when I made Blood Feast and 2,000 Maniacs (1964) and Color Me Blood Red (1965) and The Gore Gore Girls and Wizard of Gore (1970), and so on. They weren't alive. So I am there, supposedly, not as emeritus but as sort of a historical icon. That's funny too because here were movies that cost absolutely nothing to make, with casts of nobodies, and certainly no production value worth anything, and they still live, they still breathe, they are still selling dvds at a time in which some major companies' productions that were made six months ago have simply vanished into oblivion. I think the rationale behind that is that today's audiences know the difference between a producer or a director who's having a good time and saying, "Hey, c'mon, join me" and a producer or a director who is so enamored of what he is doing that he loses sight of the person on the other end of the camera, on the screen looking at it, saying, "Eh, so what?" Today, with the gap having narrowed so much between independent and major company product, it becomes more significant than ever.

Guillén: It is the humor and the viscerality of your films that have survived over generations. I'm old enough to remember the thrill of the drive-in, a style of cinema distribution that has fallen by the wayside. Yet drive-ins were essential to how you marketed your films. What about modern forms of distribution—the so-called "microcinema" of iPods and cell phones—do you think gore could be distributed that way? Or are there other exploitive cinema that would work best in that medium?

Lewis: I desperately miss the drive-in theaters. One of the problems that exists today—we see it in two directions—is what you might call the "mass response syndrome". You go to a theater and people talk because they're used to watching movies at home. They either rent the movie from Blockbuster or they got it from Netflix or they bought the DVD somewhere, maybe from Amazon or someplace, and they're used to being on a more intimate level than these movies were made to be. So that's another reason why in today's marketplace a gore movie or splatter film or whatever terminology one wants to use should—in order to compete effectively—recognize that it's more one-to-one than it's been in the past. It should entertain as well as surprise.

Guillén: You have frequently been quoted as saying that you specifically set out to create films that the major studios couldn't or wouldn't make. You are the symbol of the true independent filmmaker. With the proliferation of so-called "independent cinema"—we just had Sundance—any ideas on what might be exploitable nowadays?

Lewis: In today's marketplace?

Guillén: Exactly.

Lewis: On an independent level?

Guillén: Yes.

Lewis: First of all, my opinion would be that the independents should not attempt to compete with drawing room comedy that can be shown both on TV and in a series or in the theater with name stars whose name recognition automatically means attention on a critical—and maybe even on an attendance—level. What does that leave independents to do? Well, we fall back, of course, onto areas in which the major companies simply dip a toe without ever wanting to become immersed because they don't want that image to stain their own image. There isn't a lot available. The only thing that might yet come up in which the independent might show dominance is a subject in which the independent also risks public criticism to a point that I don't want to be involved in it. Example: carrying full nudity to its ultimate end, which is killing acts on the screen and that kind of thing—certainly you can buy them at a lot of novelty stores or on-line—but that to me is not part of competitive motion picture production.

Guillén: The verisimilitude of your films are for a specific audience. You're not aiming at the members of the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences. Yet, even in your outreach, you have been equally specific about what you were not interested in depicting, just as you're indicating now. One was you drew the line at sadomasochism. Even though your victims died horribly, they died quickly. What do you think of the recent flare-up in so-called "torture horror"?

Lewis: I am personally opposed to it and I'll tell you why: I don't think it's entertaining. See, what you're then doing is going beyond reaching into the innards of a typical person who might have sat in the Roman Coliseum a couple of thousand years ago with thumbs down. This is a different thing altogether. This is carrying voyeurism to a point at which one questions the aberration of the person who is making that kind of a judgment. That's just not for me. I've seen people who have claimed to have seen legitimate snuff films. I pity them just as I pity the people who were snuffed. It simply is not, in my opinion, part of the formula for an entertaining motion picture. It's too selective a niche.

Guillén: I agree absolutely. I watched Saw (2004), Hostel (2005), Wolf Creek (2005), and then I just lost interest because I didn't enjoy them. Not like I enjoyed your films where I would be grossed out but it was fun.

Lewis: I'm glad to hear you say that.

Guillén: Chicago's Bloodshed Theatre aka Cinema Bizarre was noteworthy for introducing enactments of gore live on stage. Here in San Francisco The Primitive Screwheads are direct descendants of that tradition. Are you familiar with them?

Lewis: I'm not but I'm delighted to hear it. [Chuckles.]

Guillén: They've performed on-stage renditions of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974), The Evil Dead (1981), and Re-Animator (1985) and will soon be mounting their adaptation of Halloween (1978). I have fantasized on your being pulled into a program with them.

Lewis: Invite me. I think it's a terrific idea. What we did at the Bloodshed, we would be showing the original Dracula (1931), for example, with Bela Lugosi and—between changing reels—two people would come out in front of the screen, one would slash the throat of the other, who would drop to the floor gushing blood. Then the audience—we hoped—applauded. Then the two would just get up and walk away and we'd continue the movie. What it did, obviously, was create word of mouth far beyond the value of two people coming out on the stage with a little rubber tubing that ran behind a knife so that some blood would gush. I found that to be fascinating. We had to close that down because of the political climate in that year. We were in a section of Chicago called Old Town and it was just, frankly, unsafe to be in that area at night. There was a terrible change of the demographic there.

Guillén: Speaking of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, one might argue that The Wizard of Gore was there first. Just as She Devils on Wheels (1968) paved the way for Easy Rider (1969) one year after. Or Just For The Hell Of It (1968) preceded A Clockwork Orange (1971). I'm sure you didn't set out to be an influence on later generations of filmmakers, and yet that's exactly what's happened. Do folks step up and acknowledge that to you?

Lewis: They do, yes, and it pleases me because in a sense it's a peripheral aspect of what we tried to do. If I'm saying I want to make the kind of pictures that nobody else is making, and then it takes some years before someone else does make one, that means I have at least succeeded in my original intention.

Guillén: One young filmmaker who is being frequently referenced to you is Anna Biller, who openly pays homage to your dalliance with sexploitation films like The Girl, The Body and The Pill (1967) and Suburban Roulette (1968). Do you know Anna and her work?

Lewis: I'm sorry to tell you I don't.

Guillén: She's someone you might want to keep an eye out for because she's purposely playing with the sexploitation films of the '60s. They're nuanced differently than yours. Her recent film Viva (2007) is like a parody of a parody, twice-removed, but interesting work nonetheless.

Lewis: It's very nice to have people say that they felt that I was a positive influence. [Laughs.]

Guillén:The last film you directed was Blood Feast 2: All U Can Eat (2002), which other than the direct-to-video Blood Trilogy Outtakes (1996), was your first feature since The Gore Gore Girls 30 years previously. Why the interest in making a comeback and revisiting gore? Don't you have enough money? Or was it just for the fun of self-parody?

Lewis: It wasn't for the money. It was because somebody asked me. As I think you may be aware—you seem to be more conversant with my background than I am—I have always maintained that making movies is like having malaria. You think you're cured but it's lurking in your bloodstream and it will flare up when one least expects it. Over the years, since the original Blood Feast, at least two-three times a year somebody would say, "Let's make Blood Feast 2" and it happened so often that I developed a defense mechanism. I said, "Put your deal together and call me." Well, sure enough, a fellow named Jacky Morgan put the deal together and called me. There were two—I won't call them problems—there were two circumstances that made it less-than-perfect. One was it wasn't the script I would have liked to make and, second, I was a hired hand. I was hired to direct that movie. I think what they wanted really was the cachet of my name, which that didn't bother me at all because I had a rollicking good time.

Guillén: Dennis Harvey actually didn't give it a bad review in Variety. I mean, it wasn't a rave but it was respectful. So what's coming up for you now? You're doing this film Grim Fairy Tales? Dare I ask what it's about?

Lewis: It's total black humor. Yes, it's crawling with gore, but it's also crawling with a kind of lightheadedness that everybody—I don't care what age, what background, what education—everybody has to say, hey, this is fun. As it opens immediately with a gore shot, the audience knows immediately that the whole thing is phony.

Guillén: It'd be great if we could get San Francisco's Hole in the Head festival to premiere it!

Lewis: Well, I have to make it. We haven't started Grim's Fairy Tales. I thought I had an agreement with a producer who came down here to my home several times and we were hammering out a deal to make it, but if you know the movie business, you'll know what I mean when I say he simply disappeared. He vanished!

Guillén: Producers have a way of doing that. Well, Herschell, I really thank you for taking the time to talk with me. What a pleasure. I love your work and look forward to anything you do in the future.

Lewis: The pleasure was mine because these were intelligent questions, most of which haven't been asked before. That's rare. So I salute you, my friend.

TALL AS THE BAOBAB TREE (2012)—The Fandor / Keyframe Interview with Jeremy Teicher and Alexi Pappas

My thanks to Jonathan Marlow at Fandor and Susan Gerhard at Keyframe for publishing my conversation with filmmakers Jeremy Teicher and Alexi Pappas during the 2013 edition of the San Francisco International Film Festival (SFIFF).

If you haven't seen it yet, be sure to watch Tall As the Baobab Tree (2012), available for streaming at Fandor.

CLUB SANDWICH (2013)—The Fandor / Keyframe Interview with Fernando Eimbcke

My thanks to Jonathan Marlow at Fandor and Susan Gerhard at Keyframe for inviting me to interview Fernando Eimbcke during the 2014 edition of the San Francisco International Film Festival (SFIFF), when Club Sandwich (2013) screened for Bay Area audiences. It's taken me a while to get that conversation transcribed and then a bit more to get it up on their site, but hopefully the delay will be worth the wait, just as we turn our sights to the 2015 edition of SFIFF! The interview is here.

If you haven't seen it yet, be sure to watch Eimbcke's previous effort Lake Tahoe (2009), available for streaming at Fandor.