Darwin Awards And Cranky Beasts

 I have an image blog today. Enjoy!

The Devil Has Come To Tsavo

Some links before I get started today. Yesterday was Sunday, so we had a Snippet Sunday post at our joint blog. Cheryl had pics from an air show in her area. Parsnip had a video clip at her page and a look at a number of pics. Hilary has her birthday today. And the Whisk has a pair of troublemakers at her blog. Also, keep an eye on my photoblog by clicking at the right, as I've got Remembrance Day material for today and tomorrow.

Now then, today I have another movie review.

“I’m a monster. My only pleasure is in tormenting those who work for me.” ~ Robert Beaumont

“Darling, you know how God invented liquor so the Irish wouldn’t rule the world. Well I think he may have invented being stubborn so we can be the best at something.” ~ John Patterson

“Oh, you’re right. The devil has come to Tsavo. Look at me! I am the devil.” ~ Charles Remington

In 1898, a bridge construction over the river Tsavo in Africa was interrupted by a pair of lions, hunting and killing railway workers in the dozens, over a hundred by some counts. The lions were hunted down and killed by the project engineer, a British colonel named John Patterson, and their story has baffled people ever since. The man eaters can be found to this day in the Field Museum in Chicago, where they have been preserved and are on display. The story inspired screen writer William Goldman (The Princess Bride) to adapt it for the big screen, fictionalizing some aspects, but telling a story of murderous danger in the African high grasses, set against the backdrop of European colonial expansion at the end of the 19^th century. Director Stephen Hopkins (Blown Away) came on board to helm the film, a historical adventure in a changing Africa.

We meet Colonel Patterson (Val Kilmer), an Irishman in the British military with a reputation for doing good work as an engineer in challenging locations. He’s hired by Robert Beaumont (Tom Wilkinson), a tyrant of a financier, who’s trying to have a railroad built in Africa in order to win the race against other European colonial powers, to save Africa from the Africans, and secure his knighthood. Whichever is his priority is another matter, but Beaumont admits he’s a monster, and promises Patterson that he’ll hate him. Patterson is off to Africa after saying goodbye to his wife Helena (Emily Mortimer), who is expecting their first child.

Patterson’s quite happy to come to Africa, a place he’s dreamed of seeing, meeting his right hand man Angus Starling (Brian McCardie), the camp foreman Samuel (John Kani), and the doctor, David Hawthorne (Bernard Hill). There’s tension in the camp, between the local African workers and those who have come from India for the work. The two sides don’t like each other, Samuel explains, and the Indians don’t like other Indians- the religious differences between Muslim and Hindu rising to the surface. There’s also the problem of a lion attack before Patterson’s arrival. Patterson doesn't realize that the lions in the area will soon become a much bigger problem, in the form of two males that hunt together, seeming to kill just for the pleasure of killing. The workers take to calling them the Ghost and the Darkness.

Goldman’s script fictionalizes certain aspects of the story, including bringing in an American big game hunter, Charles Remington, played by Michael Douglas, who finally appears in a dramatic way halfway through the film. The story also ignores the fact that the lions of the Tsavo region tend to lack manes; in fact, the pair of lions still on display in Chicago have no manes. However, these are mere trifles. The story is one of suspense and dread, and for me, that’s how it’s always worked. It’s an action thriller that drives up the tension, because we don’t understand why these lions are behaving this way. More than one character points out that lions don’t act like this, they don’t kill just for the sport, and yet these lions do. The story makes us look at the long grass in a completely different way; when Patterson is first travelling and seeing wildlife, we’re struck by the beauty of the land, but we quickly start looking at those grasslands and ask ourselves what’s hiding in that long grass. It leaves the audience feeling a sense of dread; the film does for the African savanna what Jaws did for the ocean.

Goldman also allows for humour and characterization as he goes along. He frames the story with a narrator, using Samuel to recount the events. This is an unusual touch compared to what a film of fifty or sixty years ago might have gone with, as it features an African voice to tell the story, and Goldman gives his narrator depth. Characterization tends to show itself in smaller ways and in quiet moments, such as when we learn Remington’s sad past, or see Patterson’s longing to see his wife again play itself out in letters home. The film refrains from glossing over the racial issues, as tensions among the workers keep cropping up, one of them even acidly remarking to Patterson, “you’re white, you can do anything.” The humour on the other hand plays out in dialogue between characters, mostly at night around campfires, such as Samuel teasing Remington: “I don’t believe you had a mother.”

Hopkins has a good visual style for the story; his work on Blown Away with its themes of Irish terrorism and revenge showed that, and he handled the direction for this well, sometimes giving us the lion’s point of view in how a scene was shot, sometimes using the light of fires as the only lighting for a scene, giving it a more dangerous, uncertain quality. There’s a sequence where one of the lions gets caught in a trap where a group of handpicked riflemen are waiting; the way he films the sequence has a nightmarish feel where you can almost feel as if the lion’s a supernatural being; not one round hits the beast, and the roars of the animal are deafening.

Much of the filming was done on location in South Africa, and the film definitely has an African feel in the look of the terrain. Real lions were used in the filming, albeit ones that have worked with humans extensively and were trained. I recall a documentary on the filming, which showed that the attacks were filmed in three stages: first on sound stages with the lions just being lions, pouncing upon an invisible prey against a green screen. The camera movements of that shot were memorized by computer and replicated with a second shot featuring whichever victim might be falling next, and the third shot used the exterior footage, all blending together seamlessly. Almost everything we see are real lions, though with a couple of exceptions, and in fact the real lions themselves, from a zoo in Ontario, were not quite sure of themselves in the open, having had lived their lives among people instead of zebras and antelopes.

The score is by Jerry Goldsmith, and it’s my favourite personal work by him. It blends together Irish and English sounds with a rich African influence into a single score, making liberal use of choral voices. It’s a blend of adventurous themes and malevolent, dangerous motifs that just drive up the tension all that much more.

Tom Wilkinson is only in the film briefly, on a couple of occasions, and this was the first film I ever saw featuring him. He makes a huge impression though. His Beaumont is an arrogant man, totally contemptuous of those around him. He says he’s a monster, and he certainly proves it, treating the deaths of dozens of workers with disdain, not giving a damn about anything but his own ambitions. By contrast, Emily Mortimer, who turns up here and there mostly in letters (and a nightmare sequence) is a loving and supportive wife, eager to see her husband again, to present him with their first born, and proud of him. Their relationship seems grounded, and she’s secure enough in herself to let him go off on a trip he’s wanted to make his entire life.

Bernard Hill, who would go on to appear in Titanic as Captain Smith and The Lord Of The Rings films as Theoden, plays Hawthorne as a drunken hard edged cynic who sees the railway as a sham, but admits that no one else would hire him. Cynic though he might be, he still acts to protect and care for his patients. Brian McCardie plays Angus as an idealistic man, quite out of his element, but relentlessly cheerful. Aside from his practical work, he also thinks of himself as a missionary doing the good work of the Lord in Africa. He’s given to talking a lot, and informs Patterson and Samuel that he has taken on a great task even more difficult than the salvation of Africa: he will not rest until both of them are safely in the fold. 

John Kani is a South African actor and playwright, and he gets to play the pivotal role of Samuel, the only man in the camp that everyone trusts. He plays the role with conviction and gravity, so the audience can believe him as a foreman, and as a man who’s good at mediating disputes. There’s a great warmth to the performance, a character we get to like very much. Patterson certainly gets along with him right from the beginning, and we learn he’s been friends with Remington for years. We also learn more about the man himself- he has several wives (he doesn’t like any of them, mind you), and he admits that he’s afraid of lions. Fear or not, he still acts without hesitation in the face of danger.

Michael Douglas was one of the producers on the film, and took the fictional role of Remington for himself. He comes into the story in a big, sudden way in the midst of a lot of tension in a crowd, and certainly makes an impression. Remington, we learn, is a man who does not like hunting, a strange thing in a man who makes that his profession, and only does it because he happens to be good at it. He hunts all over the world, but never returns to America; it turns out he lost everything in the Civil War when his family died. He mourns that loss years later, but doesn’t go too much into it, so we’re left to wonder at the tragedy. He makes for a good mentor for Patterson, and the two get along well with each other. Douglas conveys all of these aspects of the character with gravity and depth. He also moves like a hunter, with precision, speed when needed, care and slowness when needed as well.

Kilmer is a good protagonist for the film, taking on the role of Patterson and playing it in what feels just the right way. He might be a military officer, but as an Irishman, he’s always going to be an outsider among English officers, and that attribute does come across. He’s hired, not accepted, by the English financier, and he knows it. Kilmer gives him the competent, efficient sensibility that you’d expect out of an engineer, mixing that with qualities of a devoted husband and a man happy to get out to a place he’s dreamed of for years. Patterson is a man who genuinely gets along with the people who work for him, a stark contrast to his employers, and he shows concern for the well being of those around him. He forms friendships with the locals, particularly Samuel, in a way that another British officer would never think of, so it’s a measure of his personal integrity and decent nature.

The Ghost And The Darkness is one of my personal favourite action thrillers, an adventure set in an Africa undergoing great change. It takes full advantage of the beautiful surroundings before driving the audience into a tense, uneasy state at the sign of long savanna grasses… and what beasts might lurk within. 

The Lawmen, The Cowboys, And The O.K. Corral

Some links before I get things started today. Norma has new passage at her blogs for Sam's Story and her memoir. PK wrote at her blog about the passing of Robin Williams and how to deal with depression.  And Whisk has something too tempting to pass up.

Today I'm doing a film review, the first of two reviews of films from the 90s dealing with the same people.

“Doc, you’re not a hypocrite. You just like to sound like one.” ~ Wyatt Earp

“And you must be Ringo. Look, darling, Johnny Ringo. The deadliest pistoleer since Wild Bill, they say. What do you think, darling? Should I hate him?” ~ Doc Holliday

“I’m a woman, I like men. If that means I’m not lady-like, then I guess I’m just not a lady. At least I’m honest.” ~ Josephine Marcus

“A man like Ringo has a great big hole, right in the middle of him. He can never kill enough, or steal enough, to fill it.” ~ Doc Holliday

“The cowboys are finished, you understand me? I see a red sash, I kill the man wearing it. So run, you cur! Tell all the other curs the law’s coming! You tell ‘em I’m coming! And hell’s coming with me, you hear? Hell’s coming with me!” ~ Wyatt Earp

Tombstone is the 1993 Western from director George Cosmatos, following the story of the Earp brothers and Doc Holliday in the dusty Arizona town in the 1880s, recounting the gunfight at the O.K. Corral and the aftermath of that incident. It was initially meant to be helmed by director Kevin Jarre and starring Kevin Costner, but creative differences ensued, Costner went off to make his own film bio of the western lawman, and Jarre was later removed from the project altogether. It is a sprawling action film that sets two opposing forces against each other, albeit with shades of gray in between. It’s tighter in scope than Costner’s bio, concerning itself with a more limited time frame, but touches some of the same territory as it goes along.

The film opens up with retired lawman Wyatt Earp (Kurt Russell) arriving in Arizona, meeting up with his brothers Virgil (Sam Elliott) and Morgan (Bill Paxton). All of them have women in their lives, all of them are looking forward to a quieter life and the financial opportunities that Tombstone seems to have for them. They also run into Wyatt’s old friend John “Doc” Holliday (Val Kilmer) and his significant other, Kate (Joanna Pacula). Doc has come to Arizona for the climate; he suffers from tuberculosis. Wyatt and his brothers quickly get themselves started, securing a stake in a local gambling hall. Tensions start to rise with a band of cowboys, led by Curly Bill Brocius (Powers Boothe), Ike Clanton (Stephen Lang), and Johnny Ringo (Michael Beihn), who we’ve already been introduced to earlier in the film. They’re a ruthless, vicious lot, for the most part, a band of psychotics who take pleasure in killing for the sake of killing. The one exception is Sherman McMaster (Michael Rooker), who seems troubled by the actions of his fellow cowboys.

Wyatt is occupied with his growing financial interests. His common law wife Mattie (Dana Wheeler-Nicholson) is spending her time getting addicted to laudanum. He doesn’t particularly get along with the county sheriff, John Behan (Jon Tenney), who’s more sympathetic to the cowboys. He’s drawn to an actress, Josie Marcus (Dana Delany) in town with an acting troupe for an extended stay. He has little interest in returning to the days of being a lawman, despite the growing unrest in the town, the urging of the mayor (Terry O’Quinn), and the unease of his brothers in standing by while cowboys ride around drunk and getting into trouble. Everything changes, however, with the killing of the town marshal by a drunken Curly Bill, and Wyatt and his brothers find themselves drawn back into the life they used to lead, and into a vendetta that will cost them dearly.

Though Jarre didn’t last as director, the story is drawn from his script, and there’s a whole lot in it. The film was plagued by various problems at the time during production. Jarre’s screenplay was too long, with too many subplots, and that was one of the reasons the studio removed him and brought in Cosmatos, who worked closely with Russell in the filmmaking process- it might well have been a ghost-directing job, as Russell had a lot of involvement in the film’s staging. It was filmed largely on location in Arizona, and the terrain is as beautiful as you’d expect of that area. The story does take liberties with the facts, mind you. There was another brother, James Earp, in Tombstone the entire time, though he didn’t take part in being a lawman. The youngest brother in the family, Warren, took part in what was referred to as the Earp Vendetta Ride. Neither of the brothers is mentioned in this film. Another participant in the real Ride is murdered during the film, contrary to the fact that the man himself lived for many years afterwards. And there’s a pair of shootings in the wake of the O.K. Corral taking place on a single night; in fact, the two shootings took place months apart.

The film does very much set two sides against each other in its story. The cowboys, for the most part, are sadistic, with only one of them crossing the line, renouncing them, and taking the side of the Earps as the story moves along. They are very much the villains, with nothing redemptive among the rest of them. The opposing side is more nuanced. Wyatt is more self-interested when the film starts out; he’s interested in getting rich and taking what he can from Tombstone and its surroundings and cashing out. It’s quite a capitalist viewpoint, though the real Earp did concern himself with having business interests. It takes him time to return to the idea of justice; he’s had his time as a lawman, but events force him back to old habits. He’s not altruistic as far as the community is concerned, but his mindset changes as things go along. Doc Holliday is another shade of gray for the story. He spends his life as a gambler, but he has killed people, seems to enjoy provoking people with a hair trigger temper, and we sense that the only reason he’s not in jail for murder is that he knows how to kill someone within the confines of the law. That doesn’t mean he’s not willing to break the law, such as when he and Kate commit a robbery on their way out of town early on when a card game goes awry. He might be acting on the side of the angels, mostly because he’s loyal to his friends, but he has a shaky foundation where ethics are concerned. 

The crew brings the old west to life in various ways; it helps tremendously that much of the filming was done on location. The clothing feels certainly drawn out of the era, both in the fashions of those who were seeing the town as a future emporium of culture and so dressed respectably, and in the dust-covered grime of cowboys who might not bathe for weeks on end. The buildings of Tombstone, particularly inside, have a gaudy, garish feel to them, like Las Vegas before it was Vegas. It’s the mark of a frontier mining town with no sense of its boundaries, and so feels like the place might have once felt about itself. By contrast, once we’re out in the countryside, for instance, on a ranch that turns up late in the film, it’s not that hard to imagine we’re stepping onto that ranch over a century ago. It feels like a working place. Lastly, the score by composer Bruce Broughton (Silverado) is epic, romantic, and harsh when it needs to be, brooding over the entire film.

A number of old veterans of the silver screen turned up along the line during the story. Harry Carey Jr. was an old hand of many a Western, including for John Ford. He appears in this film in one of his last roles as the ill fated Marshal White, playing the part much like the man himself might have been- a reasonable man who knows he needs more help to deal with the lawlessness of his town. Robert Mitchum was supposed to play the part of the ringleader of the Clanton and McLaury gang, but a riding accident left him out of the part, and rewriting was done to delegate his lines and leadership to Boothe’s character instead. He does turn up as the narrator at the beginning and end, however. Charlton Heston also turns up in a cameo, one of his final roles. He plays Henry Hooker, a rancher who gives refuge to Wyatt, Doc, and the other Vendetta Riders late in the film. While initially hesitant to get involved, he makes a promise to Wyatt that makes us think of him as a man of his word, a stark contrast to the mayhem of the cowboys.

The various members of the Clanton and McLaury gang are populated with a cast that includes Thomas Haden Church, John Corbett, and Tomas Arana, but three of them are the most developed. Powers Boothe (24, Sin City) plays Curly Bill as a vicious drunk, mean spirited and finding amusement in killing anyone who crosses his path. He’s a sociopath, and Boothe certainly plays him that way. Stephen Lang (Gettysburg) is a splendid character actor who’s played his share of villains down through the years. His take on Ike Clanton is similar to Curly Bill, but with some other nuances. He’s a drunkard with a hair trigger temper, looking like he hasn’t bathed in months. He’s also something of a loudmouth and a bully, but when really confronted with someone who’s willing to fight back, there’s a streak of cowardice in him. Ike is a thoroughly unpleasant character, so we as an audience aren’t all that unhappy, for instance, when he gets his face cut open by a boot spur. The third is Johnny Ringo, as played by Michael Beihn. As an actor, Beihn’s never really had the career that early roles might have pointed him to, but he has a good presence as the gunman. His Ringo keeps his anger and his sadistic side in more of a check than Curly Bill or Ike, but it’s there. He plays the role almost like a rattlesnake, coiled and tense, ready to strike. There’s a particular loathing in him for Doc Holliday; something that Doc remarks to Wyatt about him rings true- that Ringo’s trying to get revenge on life, for merely being born in the first place. 

Michael Rooker’s character McMaster has to shift his loyalties as the story goes along. He starts out as one of the cowboys, but we see his unease. The suggestion has been made that the real man might have been a spy for the railroads infiltrating the gang, and in fact he did switch sides to join Wyatt, and did take part in the Vendetta Ride. His reason for the decision does ring true; an attack on the Earp women is his point of saying “enough.” Dana Wheeler-Nicholson’s role is a challenge. She plays Mattie (at least until we last see her in the film) in a way that’s emotionally distant, seeking solace in drugs; she has to play the character in an unsympathetic light; the audience doesn’t mind Wyatt’s interest going elsewhere. Joanna Pacula plays Doc’s paramour Kate as his accomplice and partner, the two of them well suited for each other- the real life couple were probably a good deal more tempestuous. But we like her anyway- she’s loyal and just as ethically shifty as her lover. Dana Delany plays Josie as a liberated woman who knows what she wants. She’s smart, outspoken, likes the idea of adventure (and room service); She’s drawn to Wyatt as much as he’s drawn to her. Delany brings all these qualities across in her performance. And Delany has good chemistry with Russell.

Bill Paxton plays Morgan as the charmer the real one might have been. He looks up to his brothers, has followed in their footsteps, and rightfully remarks that he has to back his brother’s decision when an ethical dilemma presents itself. He’s affable in the role, a friendly sort of guy. Yet there are also quiet moments in the presence of unwelcome company when we see the awareness in his eyes; this is a man who can take care of himself in a fight. That’s even more expressive in Sam Elliott’s role as Virgil Earp, the older brother of the lot. Elliott is one of those few actors who I’ve always been convinced could tear a man in half if he wanted to. He brings a hard, gruff quality to Virgil, a man who sees lawlessness in his community and decides he can’t stand by and do nothing while it happens. He’s compelling in the role, but then Elliott is compelling in whatever he does.

Val Kilmer got a lot of praise for his role as Doc Holliday. It’s generally a rule that in films about Wyatt and Doc, the actor playing Doc gets the best lines. He plays the character like a Southern gentleman, but a thoroughly dangerous one. He seems to like poking and heckling people he dislikes, goading them into a fight. He also looks thoroughly sick, though not as gaunt as Dennis Quaid’s take on the character. He does get a good many of the laughs in the film, but at the same time, we’re seeing a man who knows he’s living on borrowed time, and has a justified dangerous reputation. Like Ringo, he too is a rattlesnake, coiled and ready to strike.

Russell has to take Wyatt through a process of change as the story goes along. When we first see him, he’s determined to put his past as a lawman behind him (though this doesn’t stop him from fearlessly staring down and throwing out a temperamental armed drunk played by Billy Bob Thornton from a saloon). He’s not looking for a fight, not looking to get involved in the law anymore, even argues with his brothers about their decisions to return to the life of the lawman again. Yet he’s drawn in again and again despite what he might want. When circumstance forces him back to the way of the gun, he’s forceful and decisive, utterly fearless in moving forward, giving the role a ruthless quality that the real Wyatt would understand. And as events accelerate and he’s driven by grief and rage, we understand his point of view, and we sympathize with him. We might count ourselves lucky that we’re not on this character’s bad side.

Tombstone is not the better of the two films in the 90s about the lawman and the world he inhabited, but it is an entertaining film in its own right. It follows two very different groups of people into an inevitable conflict. One is on the side of right, the other is a band of sociopaths. It features two leading characters who trust each other as friends, who understand that they can count on each other. It's a film I enjoy whenever I watch it. 

Even if it does ignore the complete existence of a pair of Earp brothers.