North to Alaska

North to Alaska has the some of the characteristics of a Howard Hawks film but nothing resembling the same execution. In the hands of Henry Hathaway, everything gets swept away in an avalanche of clichés. Sam McCord (John Wayne), a misogynist gold-miner, is sent by his friend (Stewart Granger) to pick up his French-speaking bride-to-be and bring her to Alaska. When McCord finds her, however, she’s already married to someone else. This is hardly a roadblock in a film whose view of sexual politics is about as subtle as a rabbit in heat. McCord can simply go to the whorehouse, pick out another “Frenchie” and bring her back as a substitute.

That unfortunate role is played by the French actress Capucine, and it’s to her credit that she manages to salvage some dignity despite her character being treated like a piece of meat, handed back and forth by Wayne and Granger. She looks so poised and lovely (there’s a bit of Jeanne Moreau in her features) that it’s not difficult to imagine men making fools of themselves over her in a much better movie. Here, though, she must make do with one sorry quartet: Granger, smarmy villain Ernie Kovacs, pop star Fabian (terrible in a bit role as Granger’s kid brother) and ultimately the Duke himself, reluctance written all over his face and muttering lines like “Women…I never met one yet that was half as reliable as a horse.”

A version of this review appeared in Time Out Delhi.

Heaven Can Wait

Billy Wilder, the great American director, used to have a sign over his door that read “What would Lubitsch do?”. Wilder, who got his start writing for Ernest Lubitsch, was his biggest fan, and in Cameron Crowe’s book-length interview, he put his finger on a vital element to the German-born director’s success. As he explained, “[Lubitsch] realised that if you say two and two, the audience does not have to be told it’s four”. No matter how mannered it may seem at first glance, Heaven Can Wait has two and two all over it.

The film begins in hell’s lobby, with an aged Henry Van Cleve (Don Ameche) recounting his life story to a dapper, courteous Satan (Laird Cregar, addressed throughout as “Your Excellency”). Henry’s convinced his love crimes warrant a place in the netherworld, and counts down a list of his infidelities, beginning with his French teacher and continuing up to his cousin’s fiancée Martha (Gene Tierney), who he elopes with and marries. Though their marriage is a happy one, his eye continues to rove. None of this, of course, is meant to be taken seriously. Heaven Can Wait unfolds like a stage musical without music, set to the sounds of Sam Raphaelson’s sly script and Ameche’s mellifluous line readings.

By the time this film released in 1943, Lubitsch had a deteriorating heart condition. He died four years later – in bed with a young starlet, his biographer Maurice Zotolow claimed. If that is so, then Henry’s end in the movie, with death interrupting implied coitus with a nurse, was an uncanny foreshadowing of his own fate. “No more Lubitsch,” said Wilder at the director’s funeral. “Worse than that,” replied fellow-director William Wyler, “no more Lubitsch pictures.” They weren’t exaggerating.

A version of this review appeared in Time Out Delhi.

Honour Roll

Virender Sehwag
Sachin Tendulkar
Gautam Gambhir
Yuvraj Singh
Mahendra Singh Dhoni
Suresh Raina
Harbhajan Singh
Zaheer Khan
Munaf Patel
Shanthakumaran Sreesant
Yusuf Pathan
Ashish Nehra
Ravichandran Ashwin
Piyush Chawla
Gary Kirsten (coach)

And a shout-out to those without whom this would not have been possible:
Sourav Ganguly and John Wright, who built India's most competitive team, on whose foundations this team was built
Rahul Dravid, who donned gloves during the 2003 Cup, not because he was a wicket-keeper but because his country needed him to
VVS Laxman, still the most underappreciated cricketer in this country, and with as big a role as anyone in India being the number one test team
Anil Kumble and Javagal Srinath, who bowled their hearts out for years on flat pitches
Ajay Jadeja and Robin Singh, templates for future Indian ODI players
Mohammad Kaif, whose death-or-glory dives in the Natwest Final are branded into every Indian cricket fan's brain
The Class of '83, whom no one gave a chance

...but we didn't

47.4
Lee to Yuvraj Singh, FOUR, a poetic moment for the Indian fans. Australia's reign has ended. The crowd has lost it. Yuvraj is on the turf, mid-pitch, arms aloft, looking up at the sky and then waving his bat away in a frenzy of emotions. And just as well. We will have new World Champions, for the first time since 1999. Length ball on off stump, Yuvraj wanted to do it at one go, he backed away marginally and caned it through the covers. Everything is a blur. Australia are out. India will play Pakistan in Mohali.

Genesis abridged

Just throwing it all away
throwing it all away
and there's nothing that I can say

We're throwing it all away
Yes, we're throwing it all away

The Guitar Canon

We’ll start with the riffmeisters because rock ‘n’ roll is, when you get down to it, a guitar riff. Chuck Berry is king of this castle. Keith Richards is his queen (queen bitch?). Courtiers include Angus Young, Johnny Ramone. Jack White guards the gates.

The romantic poets. Mark Knopfler. Jorma Kaukonen. Eric Clapton sometimes. Peter Green.

The street poets. Jimi Hendrix. Duanne Allman. Johnny Winter. Mick Taylor. Mike McCready.

The innovators. Bo Diddley. Link Wray, for “Rumble”. Lou Reed. Tom Morello. Hendrix could just as easily be here, but then there’s hardly any category he that wouldn’t fit into.

The nihilists. Neil Young, when backed by Crazy Horse. Early Pete Townshend. Wayne Kramer and Fred “Sonic” Smith. Steve Jones.

Servants of the song. First and foremost, George Harrison, whose contributions, whether spectacular or not, were always apt. Roger Squire. Mick Jones of The Clash. Lindsey Buckingham. The Edge.

Picker-strumers. Tumbling melody lines, cleanly-picked, alternated with acousto-electric strumming. Roger McGuinn. Johnny Marr. And Peter Buck, whose style is reminiscent of both.

The minimalists. Curtis Mayfield. Robbie Robertson. Luther Perkins.

The savage. Bruce Springsteen. Paul McCartney, which can only come as a surprise to those who haven’t cottoned on to the fact that every jagged, bordering-on-losing-control Beatles solo (“Taxman”, “Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band”, “Good Morning Good Morning”) is his. Dave Davies, because no single till this day has sounded as savage as “You Really Got Me”.

Dream weavers. Kevin Shields’ guitar symphonies. The shattered tapestries of Lee Renaldo and Thurston Moore. Nick McCabe and Simon Tong, especially on Urban Hymns. And, when he’s in the mood, Jimmy Page.

The younger brothers. The unappreciated ones, playing vital roles in the shadow of their more illustrious axemates. Sterling Morrison. David Crosby. Stone Gossard. Malcolm Young, who’s actually the elder brother.

Brief Encounter

It’s one of the simplest, most effective opening scenes in film history. As a policeman flirts with the owner of a railway platform café, the camera moves past them to show a couple quietly sitting at one of the tables, refusing to look each other in the eye. They’re joined by a garrulous lady, and their discomfort at this intrusion is visible. Soon it’s time for his train. He gets up, pauses, puts a hand on her shoulder, and leaves. Like Henri Cartier-Bresson’s decisive moment, nothing much happens, but everything is revealed: they’re having an affair and are worried she’ll find out. There’s a secret hidden within this scene as well, but to speak of that is to deny the viewer the opportunity to experience firsthand the sweet ache of David Lean’s Brief Encounter.

The plot, an adaptation of Noel Coward’s play Still Life, concerns a bored housewife and a doctor teetering on the brink of an illicit affair. Trevor Howard as the male lead was inspired casting – he’d only begun his acting career a year back in 1944, and was not what you might call movie star handsome. Neither was Celia Johnson, who despite being everyone’s first choice for the role, almost turned it down. The makers must have seen something in their pairing that felt right – maybe the way their silences were so evocative. The supporting players too are flawless, especially Stanley Holloway (Eliza’s dad in My Fair Lady) and Joyce Carey as another, less cautious adulterous couple. Lean’s direction is intimate and measured, a world removed from Lawrence of Arabia, the film he’s most famous for. Robert Krasker’s camera, anticipating his singular work on Carol Reed’s The Third Man, is at its best when confronted with rain, or tunnels, or the night. Brief Encounter has a restraint and formality to it that is extremely British, yet at no point does it feel false or forced. To be seen with Wong Kar-Wai’s In the Mood for Love in the ultimate unrequited love double-bill.