My night to watch Peter O’Toole movies was somewhat of a wash, as I only saw two of the five films I had hoped to enjoy. I have seen all but one of them in their entirety before, but they are always good a second time, a third, a fourth, and well most of you know by now how much I love old Pete and how coming across his films is like finding an oasis in a desert.
Of course I am quite certain I am not obsessed with him in the sense that I would name my first-born son after him (having a child being a remote possibility to sheer impossibility as it is) or speak of him incessantly, or have practically every topic discussed ultimately connect to him. Like: A good part of what is called the Middle East is on fire. Oh what would Peter O’Toole think of all the protests? As Lawrence, he was with the Arabs you know? No, I do love the Irish bugger but I am happy to love him as a brilliant actor, the likes of whom I have not and may not see again. Plus I admire anyone who turns down a knighthood for personal and political reasons!
The “green socks” in the title of this entry refers to O’Toole’s trademark green socks. I read in an old interview with Playboy that he does not walk out of the house without them and if you have seen his films, you can see how he does with his “drunk suit” in My Favorite Year, or in the opening scene of Lawrence of Arabia when he is on his motorbike. Last night as I tried to stay awake, I paid more than usual attention to his ankles to see if he wears Irish green in all of his films. It was almost like looking for Hitchcock in all of his! There even may have been an understanding that old Pete was to do just that, because at one point of his life not only was he superstitious about it, he did it to reaffirm his Irishness.
The five films that were on last night and the early hours of this morning were: My Favorite Year, Lawrence of Arabia, The Stuntman, The Ruling Class and Goodbye Mr. Chips!.
Watching My Favorite Year is a lovely and bizarre experience. Bizarre in that the story itself is very loosely based on Mel Brooks’ experience with Errol Flynn during Your Show of Shows, but I see very little of Flynn and much more of O’Toole in the character of Alan Swann. It is a fun film from beginning to end. I find myself laughing a wee bit more every time I watch it.
I have written a bit about Lawrence of Arabia before, and so it will be impossible not to be repetitive. In recent months I said something to the effect that when all is said and done, Lawrence is one of those films that shows the white man “going native” with much grandiosity. It may be slightly unfair to reduce the film to that.
It is important to remember in the film that Lawrence is born of an “illegitimate” union between two different classes, and his identity is in flux. He would not be accepted in certain circles in Britain, and as we watch him at work before he is assigned to the Arab Bureau, he is seen as overcompensating in his behavior. With the Arabs, he finds acceptance, and love from many. Viewers may be divided in deciding whether Lawrence was in search of identity, in it for aggrandizement, or both. That uncertainty perhaps is what makes the film work. It is one of the reasons I think the film is worth watching. The filming itself, the way certain scenes are filmed like the one with the big guns are a reminder of colonial power, and Lawrence’s words themselves come across as paternalistic when he tells the American journalist that the Arabs are going to get their freedom. “I am going to give it to them.” And the older, more cynical anti-colonialist that I am thinks, who the fuck does he think he is???
O’Toole is rather good at showing the vulnerability, the ambiguity of Lawrence. The entire cast is rather good.
I would like to make note of the two desis that were in the film, brief as their roles were. Zia Mohyeddin played Lawrence’s guide who gets killed by Sharif Ali. Mohyeddin has also appeared on British television in episodes of Danger Man, in at least one Merchant-Ivory film I remember, and he was a host of a talk/variety show on Pakistan Television for sometime. He also reads Urdu poetry wonderfully, like that of Faiz, and N.M Rashid.
I.S Johar is known in Indian cinema mostly for his comedy. I remember watching a few films with him in them, the ones he did with another comic actor Mehmood.
The Stunt Man is always shown very late at night on TCM, and I never seem to be able to stay awake to watch it. Such was the case last night. I got to see some of Peter O’Toole’s fascinating ability to play mercurial characters in that of Eli Cross. I recall seeing this when I was still in high school, or my first years at university, and all that is in my memory is that of Eli Cross being crazy and manipulative. That is all I still have in my memory as I fell asleep while watching the film. It is now the case that the minute I kick back and relax, on a sofa, or my bed, I am not awake for long, and any time I watch a film with my head on a pillow, I will sleep through the whole thing.
The Ruling Class. O’Toole goes from being crazy as Jesus Christ to crazy as Jack the Ripper. And you have got to wonder how one can go from being Jesus Christ, the man who preached love above all things to Jack the Ripper, the man driven to slash and cut up women. Then again, if the character doing this is a paranoid schizophrenic, maybe not.
This film is based on the play by Peter Barnes, a play often praised by my Modern/Contemporary Drama professor. He even showed the film in his class, which I missed for some reason. I read the play but saw the film much later. It is definitely one of Peter O’Toole’s best roles to date. As Jesus Christ, the Earl of Gurney loves, he dances, he sings, he rejects the trappings of the ruling class, then he is put through the ringer, electroshock therapy to strip him of the notion that he is Jesus, and his family, part of the ruling class, is relieved when he says “I’m Jack. I’m Jack.” which is his name. No one but no one suspects which Jack he has become.
It is an excellent film, and very much recommended.
Goodbye Mr. Chips!. I am so glad that I woke up early enough in the morning to watch this. When I have thought of Mr. Chips, Robert Donat comes to mind, because his performance in the 1939 version is superb. There does not seem to be much point in comparing O’Toole’s Chipping to that of Donat, because the two of them approach this stodgy schoolmaster differently.Not only that, the story is different as well. Terence Rattigan’s screenplay puts a class twist to the story. In this 1969 version, the love of Chips’ life, Katherine Bridges, is an actress, a “soubrette”, and looked down upon by the upper classes and those in the public school where Chips teaches. What you see in the film (and no doubt, in real life) is that it is fine for a Lord to have an affair with an actress, but marriage, or exposure in Katherine’s case to his child, or any other upper-class public school children, and it is the end of the world. The hypocrisy and sanctimoniousness within the English upper-classes (and the English are not alone) is evident within this story. It took me back to a scene in My Favorite Year, where Alan Swann, drunk, and in character of one of his characters, ties a fire hose around him to get down to the balcony of Benjy Stone’s girlfriend’s apartment in some posh, perhaps Park Avenue neighborhood. Well, he misses the mark, and this man sees him hanging below the balcony, and says, “I think Alan Swann is beneath us.”
His friend’s response, “Well of course he’s beneath us. He’s an actor!”
Chips is a teacher of the classics. He seems out of place in Katherine’s world, even the world of the public school. It is confusing but in Britain, a public school is what we in America would call a private school. His life changes when he meets and eventually marries Katherine. The film is more about their life together than his days as a schoolmaster, and his struggles as he is refused the position for which he is well-qualified, that of headmaster.
I always have loved stories about teachers, particularly those within the British system because of the fissures that are shown within society in the system. This is O’Toole in a totally different role from any he had done up to that point. Watching him breaks your heart. The film is really rather sentimental, but old Pete shines. Seeing this in practically all its entirety for the first time, this is now one of my favorite O’Toole films. And yes, he admits to not being able to sing a note, but he does here a bit of what Rex Harrison did in My Fair Lady, and besides, the music does take a back seat to the acting performances which were rather good.
All in all, it was not the night I hoped for, as I slept through most of three of the films I had already seen before but watching Goodbye Mr. Chips! made the endeavor totally worth it!
All the world's a stage . . . . 