4.17.2005
laughing at the big red one
i'm always perplexed (and usually annoyed) by the amount of laughter generated in movie theatres. i think a certain type of spectator feels an obligatory sympathy for what they're watching... it's as if the preview for hitch will feel "human" inferiority if you don't chuckle at each and every white-men-can't-dance joke, or something like that...
with that grouchy disposition in mind, i found myself alternately annoyed, intrigued and finally impressed with the bursts of laughter that punctuated last night's screening of the big red one, in all its "reconstructed" glory. like many of sam fuller's other films, the handling is often way over-the-top. it occupies a strange middle-ground between tragedy and comedy. this very loaded paradox may well be what excludes it from the kind of critical praise surrounding films like the deer hunter and apocalypse now (which were made at roughly the same time). for my money, the big red one is as strange and dynamic as anything in apocalypse (i'm more convinced of the latter's "goodness" than its "greatness"). but the tone is much trickier, and the brow is a bit lower. and alongside fuller's clashing collage of approaches, humor begins to play a strange part.
i'll use a famous example... early in the film, a young private trips over a landmine. lee marvin then walks up to the private, informs him that he will not die, picks up the soldier's blown-off testicle, shows it to him, tells him not to worry "cause god gave you two" and discards it. alongside this rather shocking little oddity is a long, lyrical shot of the soldier's soot-covered hand moving slowly across the rubble to his crotch. the soldier then exclaims "i've still got my dick!" over and over.
as you might imagine, people laughed. and at first, i found the laughter obnoxious. the shot of the hand impressed me quite strongly, and whereas marvin's wisecrack was a good one, it seemed a conventional excess overshadowing a more important element. but as i thought about it, i became equally impressed with the convention itself. fuller takes a rather humble approach to atrocity, never assumming he's conveying any true "reality" (for example, the film opens with the phrase "THIS IS FICTIONAL LIFE. BASED ON ACTUAL DEATH"). rather than reducing his audience to suffering armchair war veterans, fuller uses the "fun" of the war film itself to arrive at a chilling indeterminacy.
the big red one is funny at all the wrong moments. fuller's approach is occasionally conventional, but he misplaces his conventions. jokes appear where one expects eulogies, sermons or hysterics. it's off-putting to the senses. he creates a hiccup in the space between apprehension and comprehension. and without moral posturing, fuller makes the point when the laughter dies more effective, on account of its emptiness. there is an underlying silence to the film; a sense of what can't be conveyed or comprehended. but rather than cultivate this silence and embellish it, fuller lets it lurk in the peripheries. it pops up in the breath that follows a joke. and it certainly surprises you.
with that grouchy disposition in mind, i found myself alternately annoyed, intrigued and finally impressed with the bursts of laughter that punctuated last night's screening of the big red one, in all its "reconstructed" glory. like many of sam fuller's other films, the handling is often way over-the-top. it occupies a strange middle-ground between tragedy and comedy. this very loaded paradox may well be what excludes it from the kind of critical praise surrounding films like the deer hunter and apocalypse now (which were made at roughly the same time). for my money, the big red one is as strange and dynamic as anything in apocalypse (i'm more convinced of the latter's "goodness" than its "greatness"). but the tone is much trickier, and the brow is a bit lower. and alongside fuller's clashing collage of approaches, humor begins to play a strange part.
i'll use a famous example... early in the film, a young private trips over a landmine. lee marvin then walks up to the private, informs him that he will not die, picks up the soldier's blown-off testicle, shows it to him, tells him not to worry "cause god gave you two" and discards it. alongside this rather shocking little oddity is a long, lyrical shot of the soldier's soot-covered hand moving slowly across the rubble to his crotch. the soldier then exclaims "i've still got my dick!" over and over.
as you might imagine, people laughed. and at first, i found the laughter obnoxious. the shot of the hand impressed me quite strongly, and whereas marvin's wisecrack was a good one, it seemed a conventional excess overshadowing a more important element. but as i thought about it, i became equally impressed with the convention itself. fuller takes a rather humble approach to atrocity, never assumming he's conveying any true "reality" (for example, the film opens with the phrase "THIS IS FICTIONAL LIFE. BASED ON ACTUAL DEATH"). rather than reducing his audience to suffering armchair war veterans, fuller uses the "fun" of the war film itself to arrive at a chilling indeterminacy.
the big red one is funny at all the wrong moments. fuller's approach is occasionally conventional, but he misplaces his conventions. jokes appear where one expects eulogies, sermons or hysterics. it's off-putting to the senses. he creates a hiccup in the space between apprehension and comprehension. and without moral posturing, fuller makes the point when the laughter dies more effective, on account of its emptiness. there is an underlying silence to the film; a sense of what can't be conveyed or comprehended. but rather than cultivate this silence and embellish it, fuller lets it lurk in the peripheries. it pops up in the breath that follows a joke. and it certainly surprises you.
