i Page Two THE MICHIGAN DAILY FricInv Innuaryr 16 1970 i e :.- r uu f.r rtt r jvt., ",v cinemra= ....... :e ... ...: ... ...... DAILY OFFICIAL BULLETIN 'Medium Cool': Whither televised man? Join The Daily Spurts Staff By NEAL GABLER While Spiro Agnew was throwing brickbats, at Chet and David to the delight of the silent bumpkins, concerned in- dividuals were wading through the crap and giving the Veep conditional assent. Like it or not, Agnew spoke some truths. Unfortunately, he failed to grasp the real relationship be- tween the people and their media. And that's what Haskell Wexler sets out to explore in Medium Cool now playing at the Fifth Forum. Manly people have bewailed the rise of the technological so- ciety and the increasing alien- ation w h i c h accompanies it. Automatons. Cogs in the wheel. Less than human. We're all familiar with the story of a guy who shows up to work only to find out that he's been re- placed by a computer. Amidst the atrophy of the human con- dition, however, people like to feel that they are and always will be the masters of these grinding, creaking creatures, because . . . well, because ma- 'chines may be able to do our work, maybe even our thinking, amid th e mint jueps By NEAL GABLER The narrator says of his childhood, "Those days were like an endless summer stored with pleasure in my memory." Now you know you've heard that somewhere before. And sure enough, there is a genre of film that is seldom, if ever, classified as such- The Coming of Age film. These are films in which an innocent young lad gets initiated into the sins of manhood, sort of a cinematic Bar Mitzvah. William Faulkner's The Reivers, now playing at the Michigan Theatre is the latest in this line, but in many respects it is less successful than its predecessors.. It's not that The Reivers doesn't know how a Coming of Age film is supposed to unfold. On the contrary, all the familiar elements are here-the unimaginably naive youth, his experienced guides, a den of inequity and, last, but not least, Realization. There is also an air of nostalgia so thick that you may be asphixiated. To top it off, Richard Moore's photography is so beautifully quaint that it looks like a Wyeth painting. The trouble is not so much that the film is bad (it really isn't), as it is unnecessary. We just don't need any more Coming-of-Age-In-The-Early-Twentieth-Cen- tury movies; what we need are a few more Last Summers. I wouldn't even criticize The Reivers if it were content to be "rollicking" (as one reviewer has described it). Indeed, the let 'er fly, laugh 'em up' sequences ;are the best in the picture. But when drama is mixed with the rollick the result is a very awkward blend. Capote's vignettes Xerox (now included in a feature film entitled Trilogy), for example, were able to sustain both drama and horseplay, because Frank Perry created an atmosphere of love with its attendent sadness and humor; the audience became a partner to the boy's relationship and shared in his adventures. Somehow, I never got a feeling of real tenderness and affection between the shiftless Boon (Steve McQueen) and the boy, Luciuc (Mitch Vogel). Sure, they liked each other, but I was never convinced that the bond between them was any more than that. Despite the melodrama, the fun is fun. Boon tells Lucius, "If you want to reach your manhood sometime, you have to say goodbye to the things you know and say hello to the things you don't." So when Lucius' parents have to go away for a few days, he, Boon and a black companion Ned (Rupert Crosse) jump in the 1905, yellow Winton Flyer, owned by Lucius' grandaddy, and head for the big city-Memphis. When they arrive, Lucius is introduced to the bawdy world of the cathouse-you know, Life. Meanwhile, Ned has acquired a racehorse of sorts, and then there is a run-in with the law and then .. well, you get the idea. It is all very harmless. And, anyway, I'm sure you've seen it all before. An afterthought: Isn't the sheriff in The Reivers also the. sheriff in another film of this genre, The Learning Tree? Maybe he's making a career of it. U requests labor mediator but they'll never be able to Feel; machines will never be able to relate humanly to other objects. Machines dont' have emotions so don't worry, folks. What's crept up on us while our metallic help-mates were taking over the physical chores was an invasion of technology into that sacred realm of emo- tion. Before we knew it there were the media staring us in the face, ringing their bells and making us drool like Pavlov's dogs. Wecould still relate but now it was on cue. As a result, technology had made a major conquest, and we were all a little less the master. Thus, the cameraman hero of Medium Cool can talk about television's assassination "script" - an hour review of the man's life, full coverage of the funeral from twenty-five camera positions, experts on violence telling us how sick this society is as if we didn't already know. We sit there gulping the media's cathartic, feeling guilty for a week or two, maybe we even join in a public outcry for gun control and send our con- gressmen letters. The law is never passed; we forget all about it anyway, and the next week . . . back to The Flying Nun. Brrrrring! Everybody laugh. Perhaps it is inevitable in this big land of ours that someone or, more correctly, some process would serve as the intermediary between events and our own moral sensibilities. The Viet- nam dementia is a perfect ex- ample. S i i ti n g each night watching battle films on the network news with helicopters droning on the soundtrack, you can't help but feel desensitized. Didn't I see this same film last night? Or was it a week ago? Or was it a year? Even though we seeevents the very day they occur, they seem distant and difficult to relate to. Starving Biafrans, pleading Viet Cong, murders, rapes, fires, accidents, Jed Clampett ... Medium Cool is a film about this desensitizing process. Yet it cannot be detached from and feel superior to its subject, since the film is part of the very problem it presents - it is a film about itself. Wexler bal- ances the facsimile of life with the real thing, often reminding us thathe is spoon feeding the viewer these images. A char- acter points at Wexler's camera (which, of course, is photo- praphing what we see on the screen) and says, "Look. They got film."' Later, when a tear gas canister explodes, someone on the soundtrack yells, "Look out, Haskell! It's real!" The distance betwen the audi- ence and the action on the screen is most obivous when, in the final shot, Wexler points his camera at US. There's the wreckage of the accident flam- ing away on the screen, there's the audience (us) enraptured in their seats and ther's Has- kell Wexler poking his camera between the 'cinematic event and us. It is kind of unsettling. But after all, who's been relat- ing us with the action all along? Indeed, through what process do we relate to all oc- currences that we cannot see and feel in person? The contrivance of Medium 3 Cool must be seen in the context of the film as film. For ex- ample, auto accidents neatly frame the picture. John is fired under circumstances never ex- plained to us. Harold's mother, for no logical reason, goes look- ing for him ir Grant Park rather than somewhere else. I realize that this contrivance up- sets some people who are used to the linear logic of most movies, and I would have to agree that the film works least successfully on the plain old narrative level. And yet the contrivance is a necessary in- gredient in Wexler's pudding, It emphasizes the fact that this is a movie. The giants on the screen, the story they tell are fiction. But then how real are those Vietnam battles your re- spond to on Huntley-Brinkley? On the narrative level as well as in structure Medium Cool deals with desensitivity and the media. The protagonist, John Castellis (Robert Forster), is a product of the media culture. The picture opens with Castellis and his soundman Gus (Peter Bonerz) shooting footage of an automobile accident. They get all the gore in vivid technicolor. for the automatons who will be watching the ten o'clock news. With the job completed, they call an ambulance. This is just the first in a series of events designed to show John as a Max Muller Aryan. He watches a television special on the Ken- nedys and Martin Luther King and misty-eyed e k c l a i m s, "Jesus! I love to shoot film." Then Wexler introduces Har- old Horton, brilliantly played by Harold Blankenship. It is fit- ting that we learn the basic da- ta about him through a survey interviewer. He's thirteen years old, lives in Uptown Chicago, his father is in Viet Nam, and the family has just come up from West Virginia. He's the kind of kid John must have filmed in a documentary on Appalachia. It is really of no consequence how they got together; what is im- portant is that John is forced to relate to Harold and his mother as people and not as documen- tary subjects or as game (the'. way he treated his girlfriend). So John gets humanized (It's almost 1i k e getting religion.), and simultaneously he gains a new awareness of life. He finds reality - isn't captured in his camera of Gus' mike. After at- tempting to teach Harold the fine points of boxing he sighs, "Really, the object is to knock the other guy's brains out. And then you win." He has learned, as he himself s a y s, to "cut through the crap.' One of the things I especially like about Medium Cool is its approach to t h e question of reality and illusion. It views this issue in a practical perspective rather than on a grand philo- sophical scale. Ask anyone you know about a film he didn't un- derstand and he'll tell you, "It's all about reality and illusion, see." The all-time cop-out. Re- freshingly, this movie really is about reality and illusion as the problem crops up in our daily lives through the tube. I'm to- tally incredulous at the dignity with which the media handles a boob like Nixon; that's some- thing that's unreal. At the risk of sounding like a New York Times' election edi- torial, I strongly recommend Medium Cool. Needless to say, this is ah important film that dares to experiment. It n'ay very well be the most stimulat- ing cinematic experience you will have in a long while. Not only does it examine man and the media but It also raises a question I've often pondered - Did the Mondo Cane camera- man turn the tortoises around toward the sea? Answers John, "How do I know. Those were Italian cameramen." The Daily Official Bulletin is an official publication of the Univer- sity of Michigan. Notices should be sent in TYPEWRITTEN fo0r m to Room 3528 L. S. A B d g., before 2 p.m., ofthe day preceding pub- lication and by 2 p.m. Friday for Saturday and Sunday. Items ap- pear once only. Student organiza- tion notices a r e not accepted for publication. ,F o r more informa- tion, phone 764-9270. FRIDAY, JANUARY 16 I~a Da alendar Midwestern Conference on School Vocal and Instrumental Music - 'Re- gistration: Rackham Lobby, 8:00 a.m. Astronomy Colloquium: Dr. F. D. Mil- ler, "Eclipses, Fossils, and the Spin- down of the Earth, 296 PA, 4:00 p.m. Department of Slavic Languages and Literatures: Russian Film Series - Pedigogical Poem (1955): Multipurpose Room, Undergraduate Library, 7:00 and 9:00 p.m. University Symphony Band: William D. Revelli,conductor, Hill Auditorium, 8:00 p.m. General Notices History 545: Apreviously unscheduled meeting of History 545, Twentieth- Century China, will be held at 2:00 at 1200 Chemistry Building. fellowships or grantsr- All students having scholarships, fel- lowships or grants that cover tunition or residence fees, who have not yet ap- plied them, please report to the schol- arship office room 2226,student activi- ites building, before January 31, 1970. Theseawards should be applied to pour account before the January 31st pay- ment date to eliminate delinquent charges. oYu must present your ID card and registration certificate (pink and white copies) to insure proper credit to your account. Al Michigan higher education scholarships are ap- plied directly to your tuition accounts. Placement Service GENERAL DIVISION 3200 S.A.B. Peace Corps qualifying test given to- morrow, 1 p.m., downtown branch of post office. Inquire about the following p r o- grams at career planning division, 3200 ESAB, or call 764-6338. Mc Master University, Hamilton On- tario, Department of Political SCI, of- fers MA program including 7 mo. sem- inars and oppor. for teaching exper., 5 mo. independent study and prep. of .thesis or other coursework. Harvard University: Div. of ,Engrg. Santapplied physics offers programs in computer sci. Computer applic., ap- plied discrete math, math, mnath. lin- guistics, and information and control. Appication information must be sub- mitted before Jan. 20, applic. for awards before ;May 15. Oregon State University offers MS in Management Sci. Grad. asst. avail. Sci. approach syst. analy. quan. meth- ods. (Continued on Page 10) , 4 4 tU .3 WOMEN'S LIBERATION MASS MEETINGt 2:00 SUNDAY JAN. 18th CANTERBURY HOUSE t WED., THURS., FRIDAY, January 14, 15, 16 NATURAL SCIENCE AUDITORIUM 7 and 9 P.M. Adm. $1.00 PRESENTED BY NEW MOBILIZATION TO END THE WAR State labor mediation has been requested by the University in an effort to reach a contract settle- ment with the Washtenaw Coun- ty Building Trades and C o n- struction Council. Mediator Richard Terepin of the State Employment Relations Commission will meet at 4 p.m. today with University and union negotiators; to seek agreement on a replacement for an initial 18- month contract that expired Dec. 31. Negotiations between the Uni- versity and the building trades started early in December and pro- duced agreement last w e e k on non-economic language for a new; contract. The University's econo- mic offer was rejected in a gen- eral membership meeting of the union on Tuesday afternoon. The - application for a state me- diator, made earlier that day, "was not a joint request," notes Jack H. Hamilton, director of University relations. The only other University un- ion contract that expired at the end of 1969, with Local 547 of the International Union of Operat- ing Engineers, has been replaced with a 27-month agreement rati- fied by that union last Thursday. BILLY VANAVER Electra-Recording Artist Superb guitar, banjo, tamboura Superb sense of humor Great performer Funny as hell! 14Z1 Ril STRET .. NOW! DIAL 8-6416 4 4 ..... I *The .concert which was to have been given by Willis Pat- terson, bass, and: EugeneBos- sart, piea, at 4:30 p.m. Sun-_ day, Jan. 25, in Rackham Lec- ture Hall, has been postponed until Sunday, March 1, at 8 p.m. in Rackham Lecture Hall. * * * Twenty-two U n i v e r s i t y of Michigan music students will perform a cycle of three recitals devoted to the six sonatas of Bach and five sonatas of Mozart for violin and piano. This project is directed by Profs. Eugene Bossart, Karen Keys, and Angel Reyes, who se- lected and coached all the per- - formers. Joining their talents, these- students make it possible to hear 11 masterpieces of the violin and piano sonata reper- toire rarely presented in a cycle form. The recitals .will be at the School of Music Recital Hall on Tues., Jan. 20, and Thurs., Jan. 22, at 8 p.m., with the final re- cital on Sat., 'Jan. 24, at 4:30 p.m. Admission is free. * * * The University of Michigan Stanley Quartet will give an all-Beethoven concert in honor of the bicentennial of the com- poser's birth at 8 p.m. Wed., Jan. 21, in Rackham Lecture Hall. On the program will be Quar- tet in C Major, Op. 59, No. 3, and Quartet in A Minor, Op. 132. A second concert will be given on Feb. 25. It provides a two-stage pay raise of 7 per cent and 6.5 per cet, and increased benefits.. GU ILD HOUSE 802 Monroe FRIDAY, JAN. 16 NOON LUNCHEON SPEAKER TO BE ANNOUNCED 25c NOW 4TH WEEK; James Bond is back! , I William Faulkner's Pulitzer SHOWS AT DIAL Prize Wining Novel is now 1, 3; 5',5-629Q a splendid film! 7, 9 P.M. "McQueen acts as he hasn't before, -an artfulwily bumpkin. Crosse is full of twinkle, Mitch Vogel is never overbearing, Will Geer made me wish he'd been my grandfather and I hope to see more of Miss Farrell. They're all mighty good, and so is 'The Reivers' "-Gene Shalit, Look Magazine GRAD MIXER SUNDAY, JAN. 18 8 P.M. at THE HOUSE 1429 HILL ST. , 0 1 1 PANAVISiON '"TECHNICOLOR : 4nited Artists SHOWS AT 1:00, 3:40, 6:20, 9:00 P.M. CIiIIU UILD THURSDAY, FRIDAY-JANUARY 15, 16 RED RIVER "Excellent" -Cue "Joyous Laughter" --New York{ Magazine ..r. ...,....a " A -- W~ ~ -m w -, -w w I U E