Sadly we must bid adieu to James Earl Jones (1931-2024), who achieved the rare EGOT status and whose magnetically sonorous voice indwells us both with a bone-chilling sternness as Darth Vader in STAR WARS franchise and an endearing augustness as Mufasa in THE LION KING (1994). Here are his two acclaimed performances in person, earning a Golden Globe nomination for John Berry's CLAUDINE and a Film Independent Spirit Award nomination for John Sayles's MATEWAN.
CLAUDINE is a straightforward love story between a black single mother, the titular Claudine (Carroll) and Roop (Jones), a black dustman. Both divorced more than once, it is a typical gender dichotomy that Claudine is saddled with all her six children while Roop sees none of his, barring from legally paying for child support, which none of the fathers of Claudine's children seem to defray.
Living on welfare benefits and on the sly working as a housekeeper, Claudine can barely keeps the wolf from the door. With a new man in their mommy's life, the children are anything but friendly to Roop, at least initially, especially the eldest son Charles (Hilton-Jacobs), for fear that it will be the same old story. Claudine winds up with another pregnancy but no breadwinner. Yet, does mommy know the best? Claudine is taken by Roop quite quickly, whose convivial, courteous spontaneity is just the catnip for her. On their first date, the pair pragmatically forgoes all the preliminaries and feelers. It only takes a hot bath and some fry chicken for two adults to have a good time in private, that shows the acute pecuniary husbandry of the marginalized.
A heated contention here is the ossified, impersonal provisions instituted by the state welfare system, which dictates Claudine will only receive the full-amount benefits if she is single and unemployed. If she has a beau and receives any expensive gifts, their value should be deducted from her benefits. More so, if she remarries, she will lose the benefits altogether. Such regulations passé are being lampooned during the sequences where Roop vehemently tears into the ridiculousness of the policy in front of the nonplussed pencil-pushers. Just when Roop finally muster his courage to take on the responsibility of a paterfamilias, a setback demoralizes him and he goes radio silence. Eventually it takes a family’s collective effort to lure Roop back to the fold. Their financial woes are still in the balance, but the film buoyantly suggests that the power of cohesion could move mountains as the finale finds the family standing altogether amid commotions and uncertainties.
Exuberantly enlivened by Mayfield’s rousing soundtrack, CLAUDINE commingles its kitchen-sink actuality with a bullish defiance that establishes itself as the ethos of 1970s blaxploitation films. Anchored by a quartet of strong performances - Carroll snatches an Oscar nomination for her strenuous, heartfelt turn between a hands-akimbo, hardworking mother and a self-knowing, considerate yet sharp-minded lover without being pigeonholed into cliches; Jones lavishes his glowing approachability and amiability onto the screen then tactfully lets on Roop’s own practical precautions and wiles (he seems undaunted by Claudine’s supersized brood because it is just a fling to begin with. Only when he falls in love with her, the weight of his duty starts to dawn on him); Hilton-Jacobs is also electrifying as a radicalized stripling who forswears the mistakes of his parents’s generation in a surprisingly extreme manner but is hampered every step of the way by the society’s unrelieved inequality and discrimination, whose seething frustration remains only too relatable; lastly, Blackwell’s Charlene, Claudine’s oldest daughter, is used as a shrieking example of how easy a young girl can make the same mistake like her mother if she isn’t being too careful and Blackwell ensures that the lesson is viscerally impactful - the film stays as spirited and entrancing as ever. Come hell or high water, proletariats keep their heads up!
John Sayles’s MATEWAN, his fifth feature, is about the notorious Matewan Massacre, a shootout between local miners and the Baldwin-Felts Detective Agency (hired by the mine company, naturally) in Matewan, West Virginia, on May 19, 1920. Under the backdrop of the recent Russian revolution and Communist influence, the film introduces a new arrival in town/babe in the woods. Joe Kenehan (Cooper) is an ex-Wobbly and self-claimed communist from the miner’s union, who urges miners to join the union and demand a fair wage and respect from the acquisitive company, who merely treats the workers like machines, once worn out, jettisoned on the spot.
Joe’s mission is more treacherous than he estimates. Among miners, he has to dismantle the racial discriminations and put everyone on their mettle to be united together against the company’s hardline oppression and obstruction. The stalemate of the strike forces miners to rough it in makeshift tents, not to mention a mole will peach on them for their every move and viciously fabricate a whopper trying to get Joe licked (here, Sayles's capitalizing on a female role's utter inanity and guilelessness is borderline sexist). However, the miners find valuable allies in the town’s mayor (Mostel) and sheriff (Strathairn, strategically oozing confidence and panache to his favor). But heads will roll, tension will flare up, the final showdown will eventuate ineluctably (the Western standoff passage is wrought with some less than exhilarating coordination). The film ends with a pyrrhic triumph for the workers (while in fact, the reality was far more sinister and outrageous) but why does Elma (McDonnell), a coal miner’s widow, whose boarding house Joe once stays, look so inconsolable?
Narrated through the testimonies of a 15-year-old boy Danny (Oldham, quite killing it with his freaking eloquence and ardor on the pulpit, where Sayles himself also cameos as a sermonizing fanatic), Elma’s son, who is a miner and a prospective Baptist preacher, and cued by Daring's melancholic, soul-stirring harmonica or string strains, MATEWAN is a magnificently hard-edged think piece about the unifying force of syndicalism, and how a brutal battle must be fought against the corporal avarice and barbarism. Then on the strength of Sayles’s distinct narratological faculty and Wexler’s Oscar-nominated cinematography, which produces a stunning emerald sheen that showers the film's shady period setting and illuminates the dark mineshaft, MATEWAN is also an instant classic of cinematic grandeur and superb filmic craftsmanship.
As the lead, Cooper, a johnny-come-lately debuting on the celluloid at the age of 36, is definitely a person to be reckoned with. For all the intensity required for Joe to be persuasive and level-headed, Cooper insistently keeps emotionality bubbling under. His Joe isn't a hoking agent provocateur, but a conscientious observer and commenter. He doesn't come from afar to promulgate, but to guide folks out of their benightedness with rationality and intelligence, which only leaves the ending to be felt more aggrieved.
In the supporting role, Jones's “Few Clothes” Johnson is a black coal miner who is wise and astute enough to stay out of harm's way. After drawing the short straw in a pivotal scene, Jones perfectly registers a pinprick of uneasiness on top of Johnson's chummy veneer, convincingly betraying his own trepidation and misgivings. So when the odious mission is called off in the last minute, his sigh of relief and elation is a genuine moment of defused suspense.
Apparently, Jones's forte is playing a blue-collar character, including his Oscar-nominated role in Martin Ritt’s THE GREAT WHITE HOPE (1970). By radiating warmth, compassion, and camaraderie for good measure, Jones's legacy can be corroborated by these two films, an exemplar of common goodness and disarming chirpiness hailed from the have-nots.
referential entries: Martin Ritt’s THE GREAT WHITE HOPE (1970, 7.2/10); Kasi Lemmons’s EVE’S BAYOU (1997, 7.7/10); John Sayles’s PASSION FISH (1992, 7.2/10), THE SECRET OF ROAN INISH (1994, 7.4/10).
John Sayles投入了自己的积蓄制作完成了这部小成本影片，问他为什么会对这样的主题感兴趣，他说他有一段时间经常在弗吉尼亚地区搭顺风车，他遇到的大多都是矿工，闲聊当中他们向他讲述自己艰苦的工作环境，但同时又能感觉到他们每个人都对自己的工作感到非常骄傲，这些人的祖辈们也是矿工，很多人都是20年代矿工运动及工会成立的见证者。John Sayles说如果“讲故事”除了满足休闲娱乐的需要之外还有什么积极作用的话，就是故事可以令“个人”感受到“他人的生活”，将人们互相联系起来，从我们素昧平生的人那里汲取知识或者力量，使我们超越个人经历向更广阔的世界观看。“我在弗吉尼亚遇到的那些人他们有非常动人的故事，而我愿意将他们的故事传播的更远更广。”
1
首先凸显了这是美国悲剧。为什么呢？劳资纠纷可能是全世界自古以来的烦恼，但是为什么有这么多人会死呢？主要是因为劳资双方手上都有枪，这是一个美国多年来没有解决的问题。
所以事情不怕矛盾发展，就害怕矛盾用暴力解决。这个故事发展发展，就变成了最后的场景。
我们看到很多的美国悲剧就是这么酿成的。这可是个真实事件，我看到那个建筑物上面贴的牌子了，说1920年5月19号这场战争留下的弹孔就在这里。（悲剧的还有一个背景就是他们刚刚参加完第1次世界大战）
2
一对比之下，本片最大的问题就是没有安排洗澡的情节，显得不真实。开矿的场景也只是一开始出现了一下，你知道矿工洗澡有多么不容易吗？不洗也就罢了，一洗一盆黑水。爸爸洗完了给老婆洗，老婆洗完了给孩子洗。家庭也不是联产承包制，而是赤裸裸的等级制。这都发生在19世纪末。
看过英国作家劳伦斯的作品就知道，那矿工真不是一般人能当的，不是一般人能忍受的。天天黑的跟个鬼一样。而贝里导演就能够把那种法国矿工的艰辛反映出来，还有他们参加游乐场的快乐心情。所以这个片没有精心设计一些体质性的矿工感受。
当然这个片还是很优秀的。他与萌芽只相隔二三十年，所以很多结构是相似的。比如有矿工就有内鬼，萌芽也是在斗内鬼。但对于正派和反派，萌芽设置的就是比较传统的戏剧矛盾，让矛盾越来越激化，然后逐步等待释放。
本部片子就非常值得夸耀的现代。人物表现的很有历史感，有力量，但是却不脸谱化，不极端化。所以你不知道最后会发生什么。
1920年代，他们都说罗斯福总统不坏，穿衣打扮也都有那个味儿。
男主角跟家乡说拜拜，来到了梅特湾煤矿小镇，也就是这个电影的标题。所有的道具都是惊人的有细节，确实花了很多心思，连打光都是。比如火车上用的马灯，是红颜色的罩子，我在当时的美国广告上就看过这种东西。还有当时的汽车，人们戴的帽子，家里面摆的桌椅。我特别喜欢第34分钟的衣夹子。n两个影帝的演出。特别是黑人琼斯，他演的是一个没觉醒的矿工。也是一直在底层被资本家压榨的对象。
这部电影最杰出的是，你永远不知道后面会发生什么，而气氛又如此的真实。导演在这方面做了很多工作。男主角Cooper坚持不搞枪战，而最后得到这样的下场，让所有人惋惜。真的是太可信了。
公司派人夺取所谓公司财产的时候，所有的小镇居民被迫到野地里扎营，在那里的篝火下，人们组织自己的生活，用罢工抵抗着不公平待遇。一切氛围都很真实。
还有一些小散户，在山上打猎的几个猎人。耳根子软的一个女人。出卖他人的犹大角色，戴着小眼镜。
总之电影值得细品。
Sadly we must bid adieu to James Earl Jones (1931-2024), who achieved the rare EGOT status and whose magnetically sonorous voice indwells us both with a bone-chilling sternness as Darth Vader in STAR WARS franchise and an endearing augustness as Mufasa in THE LION KING (1994). Here are his two acclaimed performances in person, earning a Golden Globe nomination for John Berry's CLAUDINE and a Film Independent Spirit Award nomination for John Sayles's MATEWAN.
CLAUDINE is a straightforward love story between a black single mother, the titular Claudine (Carroll) and Roop (Jones), a black dustman. Both divorced more than once, it is a typical gender dichotomy that Claudine is saddled with all her six children while Roop sees none of his, barring from legally paying for child support, which none of the fathers of Claudine's children seem to defray.
Living on welfare benefits and on the sly working as a housekeeper, Claudine can barely keeps the wolf from the door. With a new man in their mommy's life, the children are anything but friendly to Roop, at least initially, especially the eldest son Charles (Hilton-Jacobs), for fear that it will be the same old story. Claudine winds up with another pregnancy but no breadwinner. Yet, does mommy know the best? Claudine is taken by Roop quite quickly, whose convivial, courteous spontaneity is just the catnip for her. On their first date, the pair pragmatically forgoes all the preliminaries and feelers. It only takes a hot bath and some fry chicken for two adults to have a good time in private, that shows the acute pecuniary husbandry of the marginalized.
A heated contention here is the ossified, impersonal provisions instituted by the state welfare system, which dictates Claudine will only receive the full-amount benefits if she is single and unemployed. If she has a beau and receives any expensive gifts, their value should be deducted from her benefits. More so, if she remarries, she will lose the benefits altogether. Such regulations passé are being lampooned during the sequences where Roop vehemently tears into the ridiculousness of the policy in front of the nonplussed pencil-pushers. Just when Roop finally muster his courage to take on the responsibility of a paterfamilias, a setback demoralizes him and he goes radio silence. Eventually it takes a family’s collective effort to lure Roop back to the fold. Their financial woes are still in the balance, but the film buoyantly suggests that the power of cohesion could move mountains as the finale finds the family standing altogether amid commotions and uncertainties.
Exuberantly enlivened by Mayfield’s rousing soundtrack, CLAUDINE commingles its kitchen-sink actuality with a bullish defiance that establishes itself as the ethos of 1970s blaxploitation films. Anchored by a quartet of strong performances - Carroll snatches an Oscar nomination for her strenuous, heartfelt turn between a hands-akimbo, hardworking mother and a self-knowing, considerate yet sharp-minded lover without being pigeonholed into cliches; Jones lavishes his glowing approachability and amiability onto the screen then tactfully lets on Roop’s own practical precautions and wiles (he seems undaunted by Claudine’s supersized brood because it is just a fling to begin with. Only when he falls in love with her, the weight of his duty starts to dawn on him); Hilton-Jacobs is also electrifying as a radicalized stripling who forswears the mistakes of his parents’s generation in a surprisingly extreme manner but is hampered every step of the way by the society’s unrelieved inequality and discrimination, whose seething frustration remains only too relatable; lastly, Blackwell’s Charlene, Claudine’s oldest daughter, is used as a shrieking example of how easy a young girl can make the same mistake like her mother if she isn’t being too careful and Blackwell ensures that the lesson is viscerally impactful - the film stays as spirited and entrancing as ever. Come hell or high water, proletariats keep their heads up!
John Sayles’s MATEWAN, his fifth feature, is about the notorious Matewan Massacre, a shootout between local miners and the Baldwin-Felts Detective Agency (hired by the mine company, naturally) in Matewan, West Virginia, on May 19, 1920. Under the backdrop of the recent Russian revolution and Communist influence, the film introduces a new arrival in town/babe in the woods. Joe Kenehan (Cooper) is an ex-Wobbly and self-claimed communist from the miner’s union, who urges miners to join the union and demand a fair wage and respect from the acquisitive company, who merely treats the workers like machines, once worn out, jettisoned on the spot.
Joe’s mission is more treacherous than he estimates. Among miners, he has to dismantle the racial discriminations and put everyone on their mettle to be united together against the company’s hardline oppression and obstruction. The stalemate of the strike forces miners to rough it in makeshift tents, not to mention a mole will peach on them for their every move and viciously fabricate a whopper trying to get Joe licked (here, Sayles's capitalizing on a female role's utter inanity and guilelessness is borderline sexist). However, the miners find valuable allies in the town’s mayor (Mostel) and sheriff (Strathairn, strategically oozing confidence and panache to his favor). But heads will roll, tension will flare up, the final showdown will eventuate ineluctably (the Western standoff passage is wrought with some less than exhilarating coordination). The film ends with a pyrrhic triumph for the workers (while in fact, the reality was far more sinister and outrageous) but why does Elma (McDonnell), a coal miner’s widow, whose boarding house Joe once stays, look so inconsolable?
Narrated through the testimonies of a 15-year-old boy Danny (Oldham, quite killing it with his freaking eloquence and ardor on the pulpit, where Sayles himself also cameos as a sermonizing fanatic), Elma’s son, who is a miner and a prospective Baptist preacher, and cued by Daring's melancholic, soul-stirring harmonica or string strains, MATEWAN is a magnificently hard-edged think piece about the unifying force of syndicalism, and how a brutal battle must be fought against the corporal avarice and barbarism. Then on the strength of Sayles’s distinct narratological faculty and Wexler’s Oscar-nominated cinematography, which produces a stunning emerald sheen that showers the film's shady period setting and illuminates the dark mineshaft, MATEWAN is also an instant classic of cinematic grandeur and superb filmic craftsmanship.
As the lead, Cooper, a johnny-come-lately debuting on the celluloid at the age of 36, is definitely a person to be reckoned with. For all the intensity required for Joe to be persuasive and level-headed, Cooper insistently keeps emotionality bubbling under. His Joe isn't a hoking agent provocateur, but a conscientious observer and commenter. He doesn't come from afar to promulgate, but to guide folks out of their benightedness with rationality and intelligence, which only leaves the ending to be felt more aggrieved.
In the supporting role, Jones's “Few Clothes” Johnson is a black coal miner who is wise and astute enough to stay out of harm's way. After drawing the short straw in a pivotal scene, Jones perfectly registers a pinprick of uneasiness on top of Johnson's chummy veneer, convincingly betraying his own trepidation and misgivings. So when the odious mission is called off in the last minute, his sigh of relief and elation is a genuine moment of defused suspense.
Apparently, Jones's forte is playing a blue-collar character, including his Oscar-nominated role in Martin Ritt’s THE GREAT WHITE HOPE (1970). By radiating warmth, compassion, and camaraderie for good measure, Jones's legacy can be corroborated by these two films, an exemplar of common goodness and disarming chirpiness hailed from the have-nots.
referential entries: Martin Ritt’s THE GREAT WHITE HOPE (1970, 7.2/10); Kasi Lemmons’s EVE’S BAYOU (1997, 7.7/10); John Sayles’s PASSION FISH (1992, 7.2/10), THE SECRET OF ROAN INISH (1994, 7.4/10).
Title: Claudine
Year: 1974
Genre: Romance, Comedy, Drama
Country: USA
Language: English
Director: John Berry
Screenwriters: Tina Pine, Lester Pine
Music: Curtis Mayfield
Cinematography: Gayne Rescher
Editor: Louis San Andres
Cast:
Diahann Carroll
James Earl Jones
Lawrence Hilton-Jacobs
Tamu Blackwell
David Kruger
Yvette Curtis
Eric Jones
Socorro Stephens
Elisa Loti
Roxie Roker
Adam Wade
Rating: 7.2/10
Title: Matewan
Year: 1987
Genre: Drama, History
Country: USA
Language: English, Italian
Director/Screenwriter: John Sayles
Music: Mason Daring
Cinematography: Haskell Wexler
Editor: Sonya Polonsky
Cast:
Chris Cooper
Will Oldham
Mary McDonnell
James Earl Jones
David Strathairn
Jace Alexander
Kevin Tighe
Gordon Glapp
Nancy Mette
Bob Gunton
Ken Jenkins
Joe Grifasi
Maggie Renzi
Jo Henderson
Josh Mostel
Gary McCleery
Tom Wright
John Sayles
Rating: 7.9/10
上世界20年代弗吉尼亚某小镇，矿工们不满自己的悲惨待遇举行罢工，矿工由白人矿工为主导，意大利移民坚持下井工作，黑人矿工则被白人矿工视为工贼。Joe,一位抱持和平主义的工运领导者来到这个小镇，希望将工人门组织起来并使用非暴力手段与矿主谈判。他成功的将白人和黑人统一起来，让他们意识到团结才是最有力的武器，但最终他还是失败了，他的和平主义理念无法对抗现实，他在无法避免的枪战中被子弹击中。
今天的观众可能需要很有耐心才能将这部影片看完，而且很可能看完之后非常不喜欢。即便当年，处于冷战后期的美国及民众应该也不会对这部充满左派思想的影片有什么好感。主人公Joe是一个理想化的角色，象他这样秉持和平主义的人不会成为工运的领导，而且按照他的方针，工运也绝无成功的可能。导演John Sayles苦心塑造这样一个角色要表达的是自己的政治观，说教意味颇为浓重，joe最后的死无疑是耶稣殉道的再现。但无论如何，这样的主题，想要拍摄成一部娱乐味道十足的影片也基本不大可能。
John Sayles投入了自己的积蓄制作完成了这部小成本影片，问他为什么会对这样的主题感兴趣，他说他有一段时间经常在弗吉尼亚地区搭顺风车，他遇到的大多都是矿工，闲聊当中他们向他讲述自己艰苦的工作环境，但同时又能感觉到他们每个人都对自己的工作感到非常骄傲，这些人的祖辈们也是矿工，很多人都是20年代矿工运动及工会成立的见证者。John Sayles说如果“讲故事”除了满足休闲娱乐的需要之外还有什么积极作用的话，就是故事可以令“个人”感受到“他人的生活”，将人们互相联系起来，从我们素昧平生的人那里汲取知识或者力量，使我们超越个人经历向更广阔的世界观看。“我在弗吉尼亚遇到的那些人他们有非常动人的故事，而我愿意将他们的故事传播的更远更广。”
尽管这部影片是失败的，但我被John Sayles的创作动机和勇气深深折服。但很可惜有此般情怀的“讲故事的人” 越来越少了，很讽刺的是，他们是被社会逐渐淘汰的。理论上我们都会认为我们需要对社会有思考有质疑有建设，从而促进社会的进步，但消费主义横行全球的今天，任何一个社会都不需要那些不吸引消费，不创造金钱的产品。那些有精神追求的“讲故事的人”不得不向社会妥协，不再致力于传播他们严肃的思考而是努力博得群众的欢心。尽量多看一些老电影吧，因为以后都不会再有这样的好电影了。
我们不妨先了解美国的农民变成工人，和整个城镇化的过程。城镇化，很大程度上也意味着工业化。土地层面上，是把农地变成工厂和配套的城镇设施；人力劳动层面上，从农民（更多是自耕农）变成工人。即资本家“收购”农民土地建厂，然后农民进厂打工。有些不愿意被工厂束缚的失地农民，就流浪在山野之间，成为了流民/山民，这就是电影中在罢工营地赶走侦探社的人。农民们因为被糊弄而失去土地，变成了工资奴隶，所以他们也自嘲地说，他们自个儿是“白皮的印第安人”。
https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s/2XHihwvrkbtEsAVI6s24eA
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