Fat Guy In A Little Coat: Tommy Boy (1995)

I am full knowledgeable of the dismissive attitude many cinephiles have to the entirety of comedy for the decade of the nineties.  Sure a ton of it is entirely entrenched within toilet humor and crude, terribly thought out jokes, or in the opposite spectrum the films are too highbrow and pretentious to the point of being distancing to anyone who is not an English major at a prestigious Ivy League school.  Fortunately, the era was not a complete wash and occasionally a film would come along that meets the middle ground on the comedic divide, one such film that I have championed for on this blog was Stuart Saves His Family in its clever commentary on the nature of familial trust, self-help and depression, while also being uproariously funny.  From the same year, the Chris Farley and David Spade vehicle Tommy Boy exudes the same thrill and fascination, allowing for it to be both a staple of mid-nineties yuppie disillusion, as well as a larger film about friendship and moving beyond the shadow of one's predecessors.  Tragically, anything with Chris Farley has come to take on an unfortunate life of its own,  considering that his last months before an untimely death were fueled with wild drug use and an irreversible downward spiral of self-loathing. Here in Tommy Boy, however, Farley is at his finest, I would argue even more so than in his iconic "van down by the river" sketch, moving between the wild and unruly antics that would earn him his comedic reputation and delivering some poignant and moving  lines of dialogue that show a very real understanding of frustration and failure.  It also helps that the film is not so invested in an on-the-nose commentary about the nature of small business as to become shadowed by its sweeping sense of importance.  Sure it is a great narrative about sticking it to the big cats and supplanting corruption, but that is secondary to the pseudo-coming of age tale that unfolds for the title character.  It also does not hurt that the film seems to have an uncanny resemblance to the world of Twin Peaks, and if all else fails one cannot help but love the iconic moment of Farley dancing about in Spade's sports jacket, it is clear in this scene, as well as many others, that at the very least the two were having the time of their lives making this film.

Tommy Boy focuses, obviously enough, on the experiences of Tommy (Chris Farley) a recent college graduate who had been on the "seven year plan," which involved heavy drinking and drug use, although with an inspired D+ on an American History final he succeeds in finishing  with his degree, subsequently planning to return to work for his father Big Tom Callahan (Brian Dennehy) at his auto parts factory.  Of course, Tommy is extremely inept at anything remotely productive, however, he is adored by all the factory workers, particularly Michelle (Julie Warner) the shipping manager for Callahan's who seems to see past Tommy's foolish demeanor for the stand-up guy beneath.  In the opposite view stands Richard (David Spade) Big Tom's righthand man who had been prepping to take over his position, assuming that Tommy would never complete college.  Both Richard and Tommy are taken for a spin, however, when Big Tom has a heart attack during his wedding to his new young wife Beverly (Bo Derek) leading to the bank demanding that the company account for their loans.  In an act of thoughtful desperation, Tommy offers his shares in the company and the factory as leeway on the loan asking that he and Richard be provided time to sell the necessary shipments to pay off the loan.  Richard is fearful of the success of such a wild plan, as well as for his life, knowing the reputation Tommy carries along with him, which is asserted during their first sales pitch, which literally goes up in flames.  It is not until the duo get into a furious argument on the side of the road that Tommy appears to have a wake-up call, one that ignites a suppressed ability to sell his product, without entirely relying on the crutch of his late father.  It then appears as though Tommy and Richard will save the business, however, a shipping error that is onset by Beverly's son Paul (Rob Lowe), who turns out to be far closer with his mother than anyone expected, results in the company, nonetheless, going bankrupt and being bought up by the competitor Zalinksy (Dan Akroyd).  At this point, Richard assumes defeat, yet Tommy refuses to give up after he has come this far and uses his idealistic antics to worm his way into Zalinsky's office, while also uncovering the duplicitous nature of Beverly and Paul in the process.  Tommy saves the company, forms a real friendship with Richard, gets the girl and fondly remembers his father, which is a stark contrast from the figure that emerges in the opening moments of the film.

While I hesitate to overanalyze something as seemingly simple as Tommy Boy, I do find there to be a real consideration of the relationship between authenticity, salesmanship and ethics working throughout the film.  The obvious examples emerge in figures like Zalinsky, who claims to be a working class man selling working class parts to working class people, but when confronted with his own statement, he clearly rejects that notion and only cares about his own personal advancement.  Indeed, it is what one seeks in personal advancement that seems to play into notions of authenticity in this film, Paul and Beverly are seeking unethical gains therefore their relationship as a mother and son is not only lacking n authenticity it is completely contradictory to their actuality.  Yet for characters like Richard and Tommy it is far harder to claim that either is lesser apt for the job than the other, because while Richard certainly knows the parts and business of Callahan's he is a stiff suit who is going through the motions and is completely oblivious to the amiable nature necessary to sales.  Tommy is highly likable and extremely friendly, however, it is impossible for him to really comprehend the guidelines for proper salesmanship, ones that are arguably breakable, but not to be completely ignored.  Indeed, it is not until the duo realizes that their respective approaches to proper salesmanship possess degrees of the authentic that business begins to boom.  However, there is also the underlying notion that the two are both ethically sound characters, Tommy in his youthful idealism that assumes all persons are inherently good and Richard who plays by the rules, therefore, assuming everyone else does, allows for the two to come of clean, even when they pass as flight attendants or fake holding up a bank.  All of this coalesces wonderfully in the first big successful sale by Tommy where he debates the ethics of a slapping a guarantee on a piece of paper with a prospective buyer.  As Tommy notes, it is only a person who is unsure about their product that would feel it necessary to provide a guarantee, in the mind of Tommy, which affects his worldview, a guarantee should be a given, calling attention to it is frivolous and of suspect.  Much like the business he now owns, Tommy thinks that good and authentic behavior is a given and should not need to be noted, only proven.

Key Scene:  As much as the "fat guy in little coat" number is the most notable scene from the film, the failed sales scene that ends in Tommy lighting a desk on fire is the highlight of the film, if only to watch Spade struggle to keep a straight face throughout.

Tommy Boy is available on Watch Instantly, you should set some time aside and check it out, or in some cases revisit the film.  It certainly stands up and is a light and entertaining film.

Exterminate All Rational Thought: Naked Lunch (1991)

I am both regretting, as well as beginning to appreciate the #100filmsforJune marathon I have decided to undertake along with a ton of other members on Letterboxd.  I am regretful because it is proving to be an incredibly daunting and time-consuming process, especially considering that I am trying to avoid repeat viewings per the stipulations of the marathon.  However, it has thus far afforded me an opportunity to catch up with a few blind spots within my film literacy a problem that I hope will be noticeably altered by the end of the month.  One such blind spot for me, as mentioned with my previous post concerning Sunshine, is that of underrated or overlooked science fiction films, which made a viewing such as Naked Lunch excellent, primarily because it falls within the confines of lesser known science fiction, while also affording me the very welcomed opportunity to fill in a gap on my desired viewing list with the psychosexual madness of yet another Cronenberg film.  While I would not say that Cronenberg hits every work out of the park, I do find most of his choices engaging and, at times, deeply profound.  Works like Videodrome and Existenz have become staples of consumerist fears and the detachment of the body in regards to an omnipresent, artificial entity that can fulfill even the most base of human needs and desires.  As should be little surprise, Cronenberg takes lens in Naked Lunch and spins a web of insanity relating to some absurd hybrid of drug culture and repressed heterosexuality.  What comes out of his cauldron of visions is a film that is parts Terry Gilliam and Ken Russell, engaging the very fabric of human life and its fractured psyche during a state of dependence that parallels nicely with the narrative of Linklater's A Scanner Darkly which provides for yet another layer of fitting parallels, in that both manage to perfectly adapt rather dense and challenging texts from equally prolific authors into a world all their own, using similar metaphors and messages to paint their facsimile of society in such a way that it is entirely implausible to the point of viewers finding safe detachment, while also being incredibly prescient and a cause for very real feels of discontent and dismay.

Naked Lunch is set inconceivably in fifties era New York and follows the life of exterminator Bill Lee (Peter Weller), a rather interesting job in the context of this world considering that both bugs, as well as particular pesticides prove to be highly addictive drugs, so much so that his girlfriend Joan (Judy Davis) is a strung out addict to bug powder herself, often stealing large quantities from Bill's work supply to get her fix, which, in turn, leads to his being fired from his job. Later that evening in an attempt to get people out of his house, Bill and Joan do a William Tell routine that involves him shooting a glass off of Joan's head, only for it to go awry and result in her being shot.  During an arrest related to his assumed murder Bill begins his own hallucinations as a result of repeated work around bug powder, where in he sees a large insect who informs him that he is to be a secret agent in a alternate world known as Inter Zone where he will serve as a writer for the various alien-like bugs that inhabit the world.  During his work for a particular bug, one named Clark Nova, after the typewriter which it manifests itself though, Bill is told that he is to find one Dr. Benway (Roy Scheider), an endeavor that leads him to meeting doppleganger of his deceased wife.  As this navigation towards Dr. Benway continues, Bill comes to realize that the entirity of Inter Zone, as well as its extended alternate universe Annexia are riddle with drug addicted individuals, many of which actively engage in gay relationships, and that a larger narcotics trade orbits around the trafficking of a particular bug based drug known as "black meat."  Of course, getting to the center of the issues is far from simple, particularly since Bill himself is navigating various drug induced trips, yet after a constant shifting of mind states, he eventually comes to realize that it is indeed Dr. Benway who is the veritable kingpin of the narcotics pushing and in an attempt to flee to Annexia, he, as well as the doppleganger of Joan, is stopped by border police, also dopplegangers of previous characters themselves who demand that Bill prove he is a writer.   After pulling a pen out of his pocket as evidence, Bill, for no obvious reason, recreates the William Tell accident from earlier, thus bring the acid trip of a film full circle and Bill no closer to a sort of meaning and happiness he so clearly seeks throughout.

Much like other Cronenberg films, the narrative and its visual stylings seem to have a particular fascination with flesh, penetration and the seemingly inextricable connection between the mind and body as it relates to identity and survival.  This cinematic theme within Cronenberg's films furthermore always seems to have a psychosexual layer added as well, one of invasion and intrusion that is made all the more grotesque by the perfectly disgusting creatures that Cronenberg's crew makes for his films.  While I know I am not going to do any justice to this thematically, I feel it necessary to talk about the particularly unusual way in which the psychosexual elements relate to homosexuality between males.  Much like Barton Fink, the film has a drifting writer character to seems to be struggling with something larger than himself that is forcefully and unsuccessfully being repressed only to blow apart in troubling and destructive ways.  I would argue that both the character of Barton, as well as Bill are dealing with their respective oppressed sexualities, ones that are necessariliy oppressed for fear of violence and desertion from society.  In Cronenberg's film, this repression means that Bill must shack up with a drug addicted woman who he "accidentally" kills not out of malice, but out of a desperate hope to escape to something desirable, an escape he and the other openly gay characters of the film seem to pursue via wild hallucinogenics.  The escape only proves mildly beneficial for Bill, in that he is arguably surrounded by other gay males, although the price is pretty severe because the various drugs essentially allow for his feuding id and superego to go unchecked resulting in some bizarre drug induced visions. Of course the image that will be easy to pick up to the non-Freudian thinking viewer will undoubtedly be that of the various writers and other figures suckling at the flaccid stem of the white bug hoping to receive the liquid that emerges upon the completion of "good writing," which, of course, extends to include a good sexual performance as well.  Bill while madly struggling to repress his feelings cannot help but desire this secretion, much as he cannot change his desire for other men.  Of course, there is also the bug whose back, and apparent form of communication very much resemble the anus, suggesting a point of sexual pleasure, as well as verbal interaction whose implications both within the context of sexuality and Freudian psychology are many and multifaceted.

Key Scene:  The bug farm scene and the revelation of Dr. Benway's disguise are a fitting way to bring this narrative to a near close and defy all the logic in the film, which was minimal to begin with.

This is an excellent film and Criterion has recently put out a bluray, I would strongly encourage obtaining a copy when finances allow you to do so.

One Man's Sunset Is Another Man's Dawn: An American Tale: Fievel Goes West (1991)

While I do not have the most liberal tastes in film known to humanity, I am certainly willing to extend my boundaries in the name of discovering hidden gems within the lesser known corners of a genre and while I have certainly included farther stretches in terms of a "western genre" film so far this month, adding the sequel to the much adored An American Tail animated film is probably the biggest surprise. Of course, it is not, by any means, a stretch to include it within the viewing list, because it is very much a pioneering narrative as envisioned through the world of a few animated mice.  In fact, if one can overlook the fact that it is intended as a children's movie this is probably one of the more straightforward offerings in the western since revisionist westerns became the cool thing to create.  Between the voice cameo of an aged James Stewart and the always hilarious John Cleese this manages to be both a highly engaging children's movie, as well as something that could be easily enjoyed by adults or fans of classic films, both westerns and non, because it makes quite a slew of hilarious cinematic references.  Furthermore, much as was the case with the recent Studio Ghibli delight The Secret World of Arriety, the directing duo of Phillip Nibbelink and Simon Welles manage to take the world of very tiny creatures and then place that within a larger world of the exploits of a group of cats who themselves exist within a larger world of humans, it is a meta-meta-world (trust me I know it sounds pretentious, but it is deservedly called such) and the animation often suggest these layers within their composition.  Furthermore, Fievel Goes Wests exits at the tail-end, no pun intended, of the great revival in animation, which was occurring mostly at Disney, but certainly applies to this movie as well. While works like The Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast and to some degree Fievel Goes West, certainly possess problematic societal commentaries and a tone of stereotypes that must not be overlooked, even the most staunch of theorists find it tough to dismiss the absolutely mesmerizing quality of each picture.  It is a shame that Fievel Goes West had a release year simultaneous with Beauty and the Beast because in any other year it would have proven to be the standout work.

This sequel to An American Tale, once again focuses on The Mousekewitz family a family of Russian mice who have move to New York to pursue the American dream, headed by the go-get'em attitude of their young son Fievel.  This sequel again focuses on the family, although it is clear that their living situation in Bronx is far from ideal, thus spurring a desire to move out west when given an opportunity by an awkwardly animated mouse who possesses multiple tickets to the western town of Green River.  It is realized, by Fievel, during their trip that the mouse was actually the work of the dastardly and somewhat dandy cat Cat R. Waul who plans to use the labor of the mice to build a small metropolis in the streets of Green River only to devour the mice in "mouseburgers" upon completion of their task.  Fievel is unable to convince others of the issues, particularly since they all seem inclined to overlook the threat in the face of the new found vigor and success offered in the wild west town.  Eventually, Fievel must recruit the help of his friend the vegetarian cat Tiger, whose arrival to the west results in his being held up as a god to a tribe of Mousecassin indians.  While Fievel and Tiger certainly have ambition they lack the skills to properly face the gang of cats, who have managed to become so liked by the mouse folk that they long the date of their party and implementation into the village, particularly Fievel's sister Tanya who is being given a chance to sing during the festivities.  Acting fast, Fievel recruits the help of local dog sheriff Wylie, although his efforts are initially in vain, because the aged dog seems indifferent to suffering.  Eventually coming around to aiding the small mouse, Wylie, Tiger and Fievel take on Cat R. Waul and feline posse, making quick work of the some what bewildered cats who seem incapable of comprehending exactly how a group different animals could work so well together.  In the end they succeed and Green River becomes a place for friendly animals to co-habitate and as a point of respect Wylie appoints Fievel as a sheriff in the town.

The pioneer is a major trope within a handful of westerns, and while it has yet to be a major narrative in any of the previously reviewed films it, nonetheless, manages to have elements in the various stories, particularly the idea that something new is offered in the world of the west, whether it be opportunity or a chance to escape a miserable past.  Fievel Goes West take the trope of the pioneer and studies it, literally, to the most minuscule of proportions.  Often for pioneers in the western narrative, travel and movement are a result an unforeseen opportunity, or in the pursuit of  something deemed lost.  For The Mousekewitz's the movement is influenced by their hope for a life void of constant hunger and fear of attacks from cat bullies, whereas Tiger hopes to reconnect both with his friend Fievel as well as regain the love and admiration of his former girlfriend Miss Kitty.  The pioneering trek is far from easy, as it is often depicted in the western, and for a majority of the trip Fievel is lost to the family when he falls of the train and must wander through the desert.  Furthermore, minor tropes like dangerous wildlife and the threat of native attacks emerge as well, although they are minor in comparison to other elements.  Some degree of the escape often has an intangibility about it as well, for example, both Miss Kitty and Tanya seem to desire to leave to find their voice, which while literally referring to their singing possesses a layer of assumption that the new frontier will also provide them the opportunity to challenge entrenched and restrictive gender norms.  The musical element only aides this consideration with its purposefully idyllic tempo and escapist nature, the singing of Rawhide specifically manages to exoticize the west and ignore the very real despair faced by the stark desert landscape.  Finally, pioneer narratives often involve an exploitative individual who serves as an antagonist, usually providing more hindrance than help (refer to my recent review of Meek's Cutoff), or in the worst cases have ulterior motives that will harm the pioneers, in Fievel Goes West it is a literal desire to consume the mice for sustenance.  These various elements paired together make Fievel Goes West a wonderful animated feature, as well as a great consideration of the pioneering tale within the western framework.

Key Scene:  The entire cat saloon scene beginning with Tanya singing through her dance number with Cat R. Waul's paw speaks to the layers of worlds going on in this film and is nothing short of spectacular.

Should you even remotely enjoy animated films there is no reason not to grab a copy of this and An American Tail for a steal on DVD.