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1
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, 00:01:34:00 , This is the city:
2
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, 00:01:36:00 , Los Angeles, California.
3
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, 00:01:39:00 , They make movies here.
4
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, 00:01:43:00 , I live here.
5
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, 00:01:51:00 , Sometimes I think that gives me the right to criticize the way movies depict my city.
6
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, 00:01:53:00 , I know it's not easy.
7
00:01:53,000 --> 00:01:54,000
, 00:01:54:00 , The city is big.
8
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, 00:01:56:00 , The image is small.
9
00:01:58,000 --> 00:02:00,000
, 00:02:00:00 , Movies are vertical.
10
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, 00:02:02:00 , At least when they're projected on a screen.
11
00:02:05,000 --> 00:02:10,130
, 00:02:07:00 , The city is horizontal, except for what we call downtown.
12
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, 00:02:12:13 , Maybe that's why the movies love downtown more than we do.
13
00:02:16,000 --> 00:02:18,070
, 00:02:18:00 , If it isn't the site of the action,
14
00:02:18,070 --> 00:02:27,010
, 00:02:20:07 , they try to stick its high-rise towers in the back of the shot.
15
00:02:27,010 --> 00:02:30,110
, 00:02:29:01 , But movies have some advantages over us.
16
00:02:30,110 --> 00:02:32,170
, 00:02:32:11 , They can fly through the air.
17
00:02:32,170 --> 00:02:35,120
, 00:02:34:17 , We must travel by land.
18
00:02:35,120 --> 00:02:38,160
, 00:02:37:12 , They exist in space.
19
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, 00:02:40:16 , We live and die in time.
20
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, 00:02:44:00 , So why should I be generous?
21
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, 00:02:50:21 , Of course, I know movies aren't about places,
22
00:02:50,050 --> 00:02:54,000
, 00:02:52:05 , they're about stories.
23
00:02:54,000 --> 00:02:56,000
, 00:02:56:00 , If we notice the location,
24
00:02:56,000 --> 00:03:01,000
, 00:02:58:00 , we are not really watching the movie.
25
00:03:01,000 --> 00:03:05,090
, 00:03:03:00 , It's what's up front that counts.
26
00:03:05,090 --> 00:03:07,000
, 00:03:07:09 , Movies bury their traces,
27
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, 00:03:09:00 , choosing for us what to watch,
28
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, 00:03:11:00 , then moving on to something else.
29
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, 00:03:17:00 , They do the work of our voluntary attention,
30
00:03:17,000 --> 00:03:21,130
, 00:03:20:13 , and so we must suppress that faculty as we watch.
31
00:03:21,130 --> 00:03:28,000
, 00:03:25:00 , Our involuntary attention must come to the fore.
32
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, 00:03:30:00 , But what if we watch with our voluntary attention,
33
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, 00:03:32:00 , instead of letting the movies direct us?
34
00:03:36,000 --> 00:03:38,000
, 00:03:38:00 , If we can appreciate documentaries for their dramatic qualities,
35
00:03:38,000 --> 00:03:41,000
, 00:03:41:00 , perhaps we can appreciate fiction films
36
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, 00:03:43:13 , for their documentary revelations.
37
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, 00:03:52:00 , And what if suspense is just another alienation effect.
38
00:03:52,000 --> 00:03:57,000
, 00:03:55:00 , Isn't that what Hitchcock taught?
39
00:03:57,000 --> 00:04:02,000
, 00:04:01:00 , For him, suspense was a means of enlivening his touristy travelogues.
40
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, 00:04:07:00 , Then maybe I can find another way to animate this city symphony in reverse.
41
00:04:09,000 --> 00:04:13,000
, 00:04:12:00 , Maybe this effort to see how movies depict Los Angeles
42
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, 00:04:16:13 , may seem more than wrong-headed or mean-spirited.
43
00:04:27,000 --> 00:04:29,000
, 00:04:29:00 , Los Angeles, it is said,
44
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, 00:04:31:00 , is the most photographed city in the world.
45
00:04:33,010 --> 00:04:35,010
, 00:04:35:01 , If you walk around enough,
46
00:04:35,010 --> 00:04:37,000
, 00:04:37:00 , you'll start to notice
47
00:04:37,000 --> 00:04:39,000
, 00:04:39:00 , the mysterious temporary signs
48
00:04:39,000 --> 00:05:01,000
, 00:04:41:00 , that direct crew members to a movie location.
49
00:05:01,000 --> 00:05:03,000
, 00:05:03:00 , If you walk through the right neighborhoods,
50
00:05:03,000 --> 00:05:05,000
, 00:05:05:00 , you'll see the long rows of white trucks
51
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, 00:05:07:00 , that mark and fence off a location shoot.
52
00:05:14,000 --> 00:05:19,170
, 00:05:19:00 , Los Angeles is where the relation between reality and representation gets muddled.
53
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, 00:05:21:17 , [Newspaper headline: 2 Charged in Murder Like One in Film They Produced]
54
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, 00:05:25:00 , Their film is about the killing of a strip club mogul.
55
00:05:28,000 --> 00:05:29,000
, 00:05:29:00 , Six years earlier,
56
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, 00:05:31:00 , the producer and the star had conspired to murder
57
00:05:31,000 --> 00:05:34,000
, 00:05:34:00 , the real owner of the strip club where the film is set
58
00:05:34,000 --> 00:05:46,000
, 00:05:36:00 , and take over his empire.
59
00:05:46,000 --> 00:05:48,000
, 00:05:48:00 , The strip clubs made them rich,
60
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, 00:05:50:00 , but their movie flopped.
61
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, 00:05:55:00 , A real movie shoot
62
00:05:55,000 --> 00:05:57,000
, 00:05:57:00 , can create a better public spectacle
63
00:05:57,000 --> 00:06:33,000
, 00:05:59:00 , than the fake movie studio tours.
64
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, 00:06:35:00 , In a city where only a few buildings
65
00:06:35,000 --> 00:06:38,000
, 00:06:37:00 , are more than a hundred years old,
66
00:06:38,000 --> 00:06:42,000
, 00:06:41:00 , where most traces of the city's history have been effaced,
67
00:06:42,000 --> 00:06:44,000
, 00:06:44:00 , a place can become a historic landmark
68
00:06:44,000 --> 00:06:49,000
, 00:06:46:00 , because it was once a movie location.
69
00:06:49,000 --> 00:06:51,000
, 00:06:51:00 , As it is for people,
70
00:06:51,000 --> 00:06:54,000
, 00:06:53:00 , so it is for places:
71
00:06:54,000 --> 00:06:59,000
, 00:06:57:00 , getting into the movies becomes a substitute for achievement.
72
00:06:59,000 --> 00:07:02,000
, 00:07:01:00 , Actors have head shots,
73
00:07:02,000 --> 00:07:14,000
, 00:07:04:00 , buildings get architectural photographs.
74
00:07:14,000 --> 00:07:30,220
, 00:07:19:00 , Plaques and signs mark the sites of former movie studios.
75
00:07:30,220 --> 00:07:40,000
, 00:07:32:22 , Streets and parks are named for movie stars.
76
00:07:40,000 --> 00:07:46,000
, 00:07:42:00 , Even movie writers.
77
00:07:46,000 --> 00:07:48,130
, 00:07:48:13 , A small bust near the Griffith Park Planetarium
78
00:07:48,130 --> 00:07:50,000
, 00:07:50:00 , marks the spot
79
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, 00:07:52:13 , where James Dean once played a rebel without a cause.
80
00:07:54,000 --> 00:07:57,000
, 00:07:57:00 , The inscription claims Dean wasn't really a rebel:
81
00:07:57,000 --> 00:08:03,000
, 00:07:59:13 , those were only roles he played.
82
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, 00:08:05:00 , But wasn't he more of a rebel in life
83
00:08:05,000 --> 00:08:08,000
, 00:08:07:00 , than in the movies?
84
00:08:08,000 --> 00:08:12,000
, 00:08:11:00 , where he always played a milquetoast Oedipus,
85
00:08:12,000 --> 00:08:16,000
, 00:08:15:00 , trying not to murder but to please an imperfect father
86
00:08:16,000 --> 00:08:26,000
, 00:08:18:00 , who is either too stern...
87
00:08:26,000 --> 00:08:46,000
, 00:08:28:14 , or too soft?
88
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, 00:08:48:00 , A narrow public stairway
89
00:08:48,000 --> 00:08:49,130
, 00:08:49:13 , between Vendome Street
90
00:08:49,130 --> 00:08:52,000
, 00:08:51:13 , and Descanso Drive in Silver Lake
91
00:08:52,000 --> 00:08:56,000
, 00:08:54:00 , has been named the Music Box Steps,
92
00:08:56,000 --> 00:08:58,130
, 00:08:58:13 , after the classic Laurel and Hardy short
93
00:08:58,130 --> 00:10:12,000
, 00:09:01:00 , filmed there in 1932.
94
00:10:12,000 --> 00:10:14,130
, 00:10:14:13 , Some buildings that look functional
95
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, 00:10:16:13 , are permanent movie sets.
96
00:10:17,000 --> 00:10:19,130
, 00:10:19:13 , A McDonald's in City of Industry
97
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, 00:10:21:13 , is never open to the public.
98
00:10:22,000 --> 00:10:23,130
, 00:10:23:13 , Here actors are paid
99
00:10:23,130 --> 00:10:25,000
, 00:10:25:00 , so we can see them smile
100
00:10:25,000 --> 00:10:31,000
, 00:10:27:00 , as they ingest their Big Macs.
101
00:10:31,000 --> 00:10:32,000
, 00:10:32:00 , A roadhouse
102
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, 00:10:35:00 , at the corner of Avenue Q and 145th Street
103
00:10:35,000 --> 00:10:36,000
, 00:10:36:13 , in Palmdale
104
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, 00:10:38:00 , has never served a regular patron,
105
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, 00:10:41:00 , but it appears prominently
106
00:10:41,000 --> 00:10:59,000
, 00:10:43:00 , in Swordfish and Brother.
107
00:10:59,000 --> 00:11:02,020
, 00:11:02:00 , And other buildings that have lost their purpose
108
00:11:02,020 --> 00:11:05,000
, 00:11:04:02 , can be preserved as movie locations,
109
00:11:05,000 --> 00:11:08,000
, 00:11:07:00 , like the Ambassador Hotel,
110
00:11:08,000 --> 00:11:10,000
, 00:11:10:00 , famous since 1968
111
00:11:10,000 --> 00:11:12,000
, 00:11:12:00 , because Sirhan Sirhan
112
00:11:12,000 --> 00:11:16,000
, 00:11:14:00 , assassinated Robert Kennedy there.
113
00:11:16,000 --> 00:11:19,130
, 00:11:18:00 , Sometimes it works the other way around:
114
00:11:19,130 --> 00:11:21,130
, 00:11:21:13 , a building constructed as a movie set
115
00:11:21,130 --> 00:11:24,130
, 00:11:23:13 , takes on an afterlife.
116
00:11:24,130 --> 00:11:27,000
, 00:11:26:13 , Mr. Blandings's dream house,
117
00:11:27,000 --> 00:11:29,000
, 00:11:29:00 , fictionally located in the woods of Connecticut,
118
00:11:29,000 --> 00:11:31,130
, 00:11:31:13 , has been preserved as an administration building
119
00:11:31,130 --> 00:11:37,130
, 00:11:34:00 , at Malibu Creek State Park.
120
00:11:37,130 --> 00:11:39,000
, 00:11:39:04 , Los Angeles
121
00:11:39,000 --> 00:11:41,000
, 00:11:41:00 , may be the most photographed city in the world,
122
00:11:41,000 --> 00:11:44,000
, 00:11:43:00 , but it's one of the least photogenic.
123
00:11:44,000 --> 00:11:47,220
, 00:11:46:00 , It's not Paris or New York.
124
00:11:47,220 --> 00:11:51,000
, 00:11:49:22 , In New York, everything is sharp and in-focus,
125
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, 00:11:53:00 , as if seen through a wide-angle lens.
126
00:11:55,000 --> 00:11:58,000
, 00:11:57:00 , In smoggy cities like Los Angeles,
127
00:11:58,000 --> 00:12:00,000
, 00:12:00:00 , everything dissolves into the distance,
128
00:12:00,000 --> 00:12:02,000
, 00:12:02:00 , and even stuff that's close-up
129
00:12:02,000 --> 00:12:05,000
, 00:12:04:00 , seems far off.
130
00:12:05,000 --> 00:12:09,000
, 00:12:08:20 , New York seems immediately accessible to the camera.
131
00:12:09,000 --> 00:12:12,000
, 00:12:11:13 , Any image from almost any corner of the city
132
00:12:12,000 --> 00:12:13,000
, 00:12:14:00 , is immediately recognizable
133
00:12:13,000 --> 00:12:17,000
, 00:12:15:00 , as a piece of New York.
134
00:12:17,000 --> 00:12:19,000
, 00:12:19:00 , Los Angeles is hard to get right,
135
00:12:19,000 --> 00:12:22,000
, 00:12:21:13 , maybe because traditional public space
136
00:12:22,000 --> 00:12:23,130
, 00:12:23:13 , has been largely occupied
137
00:12:23,130 --> 00:12:27,160
, 00:12:26:00 , by the quasi-private space of moving vehicles.
138
00:12:27,160 --> 00:12:29,140
, 00:12:29:16 , It's elusive,
139
00:12:29,140 --> 00:12:32,000
, 00:12:31:14 , just beyond the reach of an image.
140
00:12:32,000 --> 00:12:34,130
, 00:12:34:13 , It's not a city that spread outward from a center
141
00:12:34,130 --> 00:12:39,000
, 00:12:37:13 , as motorized transportation supplanted walking,
142
00:12:39,000 --> 00:12:42,000
, 00:12:42:00 , but a series of villages that grew together,
143
00:12:42,000 --> 00:12:44,000
, 00:12:44:00 , linked from the beginning
144
00:12:44,000 --> 00:12:47,000
, 00:12:46:00 , by railways and then motor roads.
145
00:12:47,000 --> 00:12:49,000
, 00:12:49:00 , The villages became neighborhoods
146
00:12:49,000 --> 00:12:51,000
, 00:12:51:00 , and their boundaries blurred,
147
00:12:51,000 --> 00:12:53,040
, 00:12:53:00 , but they remain separate provinces,
148
00:12:53,040 --> 00:12:56,000
, 00:12:56:00 , joined together primarily by mutual hostility
149
00:12:56,000 --> 00:13:01,130
, 00:13:00:00 , and a mutual disdain for the city's historic center.
150
00:13:01,130 --> 00:13:05,000
, 00:13:05:00 , Maybe that's why the movies turned their back on their city of origin,
151
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, 00:13:07:00 , almost from the beginning.
152
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, 00:13:09:00 , They claimed to come from Hollywood,
153
00:13:09,000 --> 00:13:12,000
, 00:13:11:00 , not from Los Angeles,
154
00:13:12,000 --> 00:13:16,000
, 00:13:16:00 , although the first southern California studios weren't even in Hollywood,
155
00:13:16,000 --> 00:13:19,130
, 00:13:19:00 , but in another suburb with an even more idyllic name:
156
00:13:19,130 --> 00:13:21,130
, 00:13:21:13 , Edendale
157
00:13:21,130 --> 00:13:23,130
, 00:13:23:13 , just north of Echo Park Lake,
158
00:13:23,130 --> 00:13:30,000
, 00:13:28:13 , where Jake Gittes would spy on Hollis Mulwray in Chinatown.
159
00:13:30,000 --> 00:13:32,000
, 00:13:32:00 , Mack Sennett had his studio there,
160
00:13:32,000 --> 00:13:36,000
, 00:13:35:00 , and when the lake was drained in 1913,
161
00:13:36,000 --> 00:13:52,000
, 00:13:39:00 , he could improvise a movie plot around it.
162
00:13:52,000 --> 00:13:54,070
, 00:13:54:13 , The movies moved west,
163
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, 00:13:57:00 , and Edendale doesn't exist anymore.
164
00:13:57,000 --> 00:14:04,000
, 00:14:02:00 , It somehow got lost between Echo Park and Silver Lake.
165
00:14:04,000 --> 00:14:07,000
, 00:14:07:00 , The movies claimed to come from Hollywood,
166
00:14:07,000 --> 00:14:11,130
, 00:14:11:00 , even though there were more movie studios in Culver City,
167
00:14:11,130 --> 00:14:18,000
, 00:14:16:13 , one of the small independent municipalities tucked into the west side of Los Angeles.
168
00:14:18,000 --> 00:14:20,000
, 00:14:20:00 , In the golden age of comedy,
169
00:14:20,000 --> 00:14:22,000
, 00:14:22:00 , when an urban setting was required,
170
00:14:22,000 --> 00:14:31,070
, 00:14:25:00 , it was usually downtown Culver City.
171
00:14:31,070 --> 00:14:38,000
, 00:14:37:00 , But Culver City was ?the heart of screenland" only in the eyes of its civic fathers.
172
00:14:38,000 --> 00:14:40,130
, 00:14:40:13 , The greater renown of Hollywood so frustrated them
173
00:14:40,130 --> 00:14:46,000
, 00:14:44:13 , that they once proposed appropriating the name for themselves.
174
00:14:46,000 --> 00:14:50,130
, 00:14:49:00 , Culver City would have been renamed Hollywood.
175
00:14:50,130 --> 00:14:53,000
, 00:14:52:13 , Why not?
176
00:14:53,000 --> 00:14:55,000
, 00:14:55:00 , After all, Hollywood isn't just a place,
177
00:14:55,000 --> 00:15:00,000
, 00:14:58:00 , it's also a metonym for the motion picture industry.
178
00:15:00,000 --> 00:15:04,000
, 00:15:04:00 , But if you're like me and you identify more with the city of Los Angeles
179
00:15:04,000 --> 00:15:06,000
, 00:15:06:00 , than with the movie industry,
180
00:15:06,000 --> 00:15:09,000
, 00:15:09:00 , it's hard not to resent the idea of Hollywood,
181
00:15:09,000 --> 00:15:15,000
, 00:15:13:13 , the idea of the movies as standing apart from and above the city.
182
00:15:15,000 --> 00:15:18,130
, 00:15:17:13 , People blame all sorts of things on the movies.
183
00:15:18,130 --> 00:15:21,130
, 00:15:21:00 , For me, it's their betrayal of their native city.
184
00:15:21,130 --> 00:15:23,000
, 00:15:23:00 , Maybe I'm wrong, but
185
00:15:23,000 --> 00:15:28,130
, 00:15:27:13 , I blame them for the custom of abbreviating the city's name to L.A.
186
00:15:28,130 --> 00:15:30,000
, 00:15:30:00 , "Gotta find somebody in L.A."
187
00:15:30,000 --> 00:15:31,130
, 00:15:31:13 , "Maybe he's not even in L.A."
188
00:15:31,130 --> 00:15:33,000
, 00:15:33:00 , "How far did you say you're going?"
189
00:15:33,000 --> 00:15:34,130
, 00:15:34:13 , "Los Angeles."
190
00:15:34,130 --> 00:15:36,130
, 00:15:36:00 , "L.A.?"
191
00:15:36,130 --> 00:15:38,000
, 00:15:38:00 , "L.A.'s good enough for me, mister."
192
00:15:38,000 --> 00:15:42,000
, 00:15:40:00 , "L.A. was the gang capital of America."
193
00:15:42,000 --> 00:15:47,000
, 00:15:44:00 , "Hello, L.A!"
194
00:15:47,000 --> 00:15:49,000
, 00:15:49:00 , "Hello, Plissken.
195
00:15:49,000 --> 00:15:53,000
, 00:15:51:00 , Welcome to L.A!"
196
00:15:53,000 --> 00:15:57,000
, 00:15:57:00 , The acronym functions here as a slightly derisive diminutive.
197
00:15:57,000 --> 00:15:59,000
, 00:15:59:00 , Now it's become second nature,
198
00:15:59,000 --> 00:16:01,000
, 00:16:01:00 , even to people who live here.
199
00:16:01,000 --> 00:16:06,130
, 00:16:06:00 , Maybe we adopted it as a way of immunizing ourselves against the implicit scorn,
200
00:16:06,130 --> 00:16:10,000
, 00:16:09:00 , but it still makes me cringe.
201
00:16:10,000 --> 00:16:35,000
, 00:16:14:00 , Only a city with an inferiority complex would allow it.
202
00:16:35,000 --> 00:16:37,000
, 00:16:37:00 , When people say "L.A."
203
00:16:37,000 --> 00:16:39,000
, 00:16:39:03 , they often mean "show business."
204
00:16:39,000 --> 00:16:43,200
, 00:16:41:13 , "I'm an actress...
205
00:16:43,200 --> 00:16:46,230
, 00:16:46:20 , Did you ever see Massacre in Blood City?"]
206
00:16:46,230 --> 00:16:49,230
, 00:16:49:23 , That's another presumption of the movies:
207
00:16:49,230 --> 00:16:55,000
, 00:16:55:00 , that everyone in Los Angeles is part of their "industry" or wants to be.
208
00:16:55,000 --> 00:16:56,050
, 00:16:56:05 , Actually,
209
00:16:56,050 --> 00:16:59,000
, 00:16:59:00 , only one in forty residents of Los Angles County
210
00:16:59,000 --> 00:17:01,130
, 00:17:01:13 , works in the entertainment industry.
211
00:17:01,130 --> 00:17:06,000
, 00:17:04:00 , But the rest of us simply don't exist.
212
00:17:06,000 --> 00:17:08,000
, 00:17:08:00 , We might wonder if the movies
213
00:17:08,000 --> 00:17:19,130
, 00:17:10:13 , have ever really depicted Los Angeles.
214
00:17:19,130 --> 00:17:24,000
, 00:17:22:13 , The City as Background
215
00:17:24,000 --> 00:17:29,130
, 00:17:28:13 , At first, Los Angeles was just a destination, not a place.
216
00:17:29,130 --> 00:17:31,180
, 00:17:31:18 , Movie characters visited,
217
00:17:31,180 --> 00:17:40,000
, 00:17:34:00 , they didn't live here.
218
00:17:40,000 --> 00:17:42,000
, 00:17:42:00 , "Are you sure we're still in the United States?"
219
00:17:42,000 --> 00:17:45,000
, 00:17:44:00 , "I think Los Angeles is."
220
00:17:45,000 --> 00:17:54,000
, 00:17:47:00 , It was a resort, not a city.
221
00:17:54,000 --> 00:17:57,000
, 00:17:57:00 , When its streets and buildings appeared in movies,
222
00:17:57,000 --> 00:18:00,000
, 00:18:00:00 , they were just anonymous backdrops.
223
00:18:00,000 --> 00:18:04,000
, 00:18:04:00 , Nobody called Los Angeles the capital of the Pacific Rim
224
00:18:04,000 --> 00:18:09,000
, 00:18:08:00 , or worried about how it stacked up with the great cities of the world.
225
00:18:09,000 --> 00:18:12,000
, 00:18:12:00 , The varied terrain and eclectic architecture
226
00:18:12,000 --> 00:18:22,000
, 00:18:17:00 , allowed Los Angeles and its environs to play almost any place.
227
00:18:22,000 --> 00:18:23,130
, 00:18:23:13 , Lake Arrowhead,
228
00:18:23,130 --> 00:18:26,130
, 00:18:26:13 , seventy-eight miles from downtown Los Angeles,
229
00:18:26,130 --> 00:18:38,000
, 00:18:29:00 , could play Switzerland,
230
00:18:38,000 --> 00:18:41,000
, 00:18:41:00 , and Calabasas in the San Fernando Valley
231
00:18:41,000 --> 00:18:43,000
, 00:18:43:00 , could play the valley of Ling in China
232
00:18:43,000 --> 00:18:53,000
, 00:18:46:00 , after M-G-M excavated some rice paddies.
233
00:18:53,000 --> 00:18:54,130
, 00:18:54:13 , More often than not,
234
00:18:54,130 --> 00:18:57,000
, 00:18:57:00 , Los Angeles played some other city...
235
00:18:57,000 --> 00:19:08,000
, 00:19:00:00 , Sinclair Lewis's Zenith in Babbitt...
236
00:19:08,000 --> 00:19:10,130
, 00:19:10:13 , Chicago in The Public Enemy...
237
00:19:10,130 --> 00:19:14,000
, 00:19:14:00 , "Say, you can let me off here. I'm going to meet my friends on the corner."
238
00:19:14,000 --> 00:19:21,070
, 00:19:19:00 , Jimmy Cagney drops off Jean Harlow in front of the new Bullock's Wilshire department store.
239
00:19:21,070 --> 00:19:27,000
, 00:19:27:00 , Our Art Deco ?cathedral of commerce" had opened in September 1929,
240
00:19:27,000 --> 00:19:31,000
, 00:19:30:00 , seventeen months before The Public Enemy was filmed.
241
00:19:31,000 --> 00:19:34,000
, 00:19:34:00 , It was a new kind of dry goods emporium,
242
00:19:34,000 --> 00:19:38,000
, 00:19:37:00 , located in the suburbs for the motorcar trade.
243
00:19:38,000 --> 00:19:43,000
, 00:19:43:00 , Presumably only locals would recognize this Los Angeles landmark,
244
00:19:43,000 --> 00:19:48,000
, 00:19:47:13 , but as they drove aimlessly around what is now called the Wilshire Center district,
245
00:19:48,000 --> 00:19:50,130
, 00:19:50:13 , anyone who knows anything about Chicago
246
00:19:50,130 --> 00:19:54,130
, 00:19:53:00 , might find the cityscape strangely rural.
247
00:19:54,130 --> 00:19:56,130
, 00:19:56:13 , "From Chicago?"
248
00:19:56,130 --> 00:20:00,000
, 00:19:59:00 , "Not exactly. I came from Texas."
249
00:20:00,000 --> 00:20:02,000
, 00:20:02:00 , In The Street with No Name,
250
00:20:02,000 --> 00:20:10,000
, 00:20:04:00 , Los Angeles played Center City.
251
00:20:10,000 --> 00:20:15,130
, 00:20:14:00 , Again and again, it has played a city with no name.
252
00:20:15,130 --> 00:20:21,000
, 00:20:20:00 , Its landmarks are obscure enough that they could play many roles.
253
00:20:21,000 --> 00:20:26,000
, 00:20:26:00 , The most venerable of these landmarks is the Bradbury Building at Third and Broadway,
254
00:20:26,000 --> 00:20:29,130
, 00:20:28:00 , dating from 1893.
255
00:20:29,130 --> 00:20:35,000
, 00:20:34:13 , It was discovered by architectural historian Esther McCoy in 1953.
256
00:20:35,000 --> 00:20:38,000
, 00:20:38:00 , She claimed architect George Herbert Wyman
257
00:20:38,000 --> 00:20:45,000
, 00:20:44:00 , had been inspired by Edward Bellamy's utopian vision of a socialist architecture in the year 2000:
258
00:20:45,000 --> 00:20:47,000
, 00:20:47:00 , a vast hall full of light,
259
00:20:47,000 --> 00:20:54,000
, 00:20:51:13 , received not alone from the windows on all sides but from the dome.
260
00:20:54,000 --> 00:21:00,000
, 00:20:59:13 , But the movies discovered the Bradbury Building before the architectural historians did.
261
00:21:00,000 --> 00:21:05,000
, 00:21:03:00 , The earliest appearance I know came in 1943.
262
00:21:05,000 --> 00:21:15,000
, 00:21:09:13 , In China Girl, it played the Hotel Royale in Mandalay, Burma.
263
00:21:15,000 --> 00:21:18,130
, 00:21:18:13 , The following year, in The White Cliffs of Dover,
264
00:21:18,130 --> 00:21:29,000
, 00:21:23:00 , it played a London military hospital overflowing with wounded soldiers.
265
00:21:29,000 --> 00:21:33,000
, 00:21:32:13 , Its first indelible role was in D.O.A.:
266
00:21:33,000 --> 00:21:38,000
, 00:21:37:00 , fatally poisoned by a luminous toxin slipped into his drink at a jazz club,
267
00:21:38,000 --> 00:21:44,000
, 00:21:42:00 , Frank Bigelow has one day before dying to track down his killer,
268
00:21:44,000 --> 00:21:48,130
, 00:21:47:13 , and he finds him at the Phillips Import-Export Company...
269
00:21:48,130 --> 00:22:19,000
, 00:21:51:00 , room 427.
270
00:22:19,000 --> 00:22:26,130
, 00:22:25:00 , The Bradbury Building was again the site of a bizarre revenge killing in Indestructible Man.
271
00:22:26,130 --> 00:22:29,130
, 00:22:29:13 , This time, an executed convict,
272
00:22:29,130 --> 00:22:31,000
, 00:22:31:00 , brought back to life
273
00:22:31,000 --> 00:22:36,000
, 00:22:35:13 , and given superhuman strength by a scientific experiment gone awry,
274
00:22:36,000 --> 00:23:02,130
, 00:22:40:00 , hunts the three sleazy hoodlums who set him up to take the fall.
275
00:23:02,130 --> 00:23:06,130
, 00:23:05:13 , In Marlowe, the mayhem was less lethal.
276
00:23:06,130 --> 00:23:10,000
, 00:23:09:13 , Here the Bradbury Building houses Philip Marlowe's office,
277
00:23:10,000 --> 00:23:17,000
, 00:23:14:13 , which Raymond Chandler had located in a shabby building on Hollywood Boulevard.
278
00:23:17,000 --> 00:23:18,130
, 00:23:18:13 , "Mr. Marlowe?"
279
00:23:18,130 --> 00:23:27,000
, 00:23:20:00 , "Yes."
280
00:23:27,000 --> 00:23:45,000
, 00:23:29:03 , "What can I do for you?"
281
00:23:45,000 --> 00:23:50,130
, 00:23:50:00 , The Bradbury Building had become just another cliché in a film of clichés,
282
00:23:50,130 --> 00:23:56,130
, 00:23:53:13 , the most misanthropic of all the Marlowe movies.
283
00:23:56,130 --> 00:24:00,000
, 00:24:00:00 , Screenwriter Hampton Fancher and director Ridley Scott
284
00:24:00,000 --> 00:24:06,130
, 00:24:04:13 , disagreed about employing the Bradbury Building as a location for Blade Runner.
285
00:24:06,130 --> 00:24:10,130
, 00:24:09:13 , Fancher argued it was too familiar, overdone.
286
00:24:10,130 --> 00:24:12,000
, 00:24:12:00 , Scott responded,
287
00:24:12,000 --> 00:24:17,000
, 00:24:14:13 , "Not the way I'll do it."
288
00:24:17,000 --> 00:24:21,000
, 00:24:21:00 , He gave the building a new, more elaborate facade through mattework,
289
00:24:21,000 --> 00:24:28,000
, 00:24:25:00 , and he turned the interior atrium into a picturesque ruin.
290
00:24:28,000 --> 00:24:31,130
, 00:24:31:13 , After a long overdue restoration in the early nineties,
291
00:24:31,130 --> 00:24:36,000
, 00:24:33:13 , it went upscale.
292
00:24:36,000 --> 00:24:38,000
, 00:24:38:00 , In Murder in the First,
293
00:24:38,000 --> 00:24:41,000
, 00:24:40:13 , a period movie set in 1941,
294
00:24:41,000 --> 00:24:49,130
, 00:24:44:13 , it housed the offices of a prosperous San Francisco lawyer,
295
00:24:49,130 --> 00:24:57,130
, 00:24:53:00 , and in Wolf, the office of a prominent New York publishing firm.
296
00:24:57,130 --> 00:25:08,130
, 00:25:02:00 , Now it has found a use that seems consonant with its career in the movies
297
00:25:08,130 --> 00:25:10,130
, 00:25:10:13 , Another Blade Runner location,
298
00:25:10,130 --> 00:25:12,130
, 00:25:12:13 , Frank Lloyd Wright's Ennis house,
299
00:25:12,130 --> 00:25:16,130
, 00:25:15:00 , has had an even longer movie career.
300
00:25:16,130 --> 00:25:19,000
, 00:25:19:00 , The most massive of the Mayan Revival houses
301
00:25:19,000 --> 00:25:23,000
, 00:25:22:00 , Wright designed around Los Angeles in the twenties,
302
00:25:23,000 --> 00:25:26,130
, 00:25:26:13 , it first appeared in the movies in 1933
303
00:25:26,130 --> 00:25:33,000
, 00:25:29:00 , as the home of a female auto tycoon.
304
00:25:33,000 --> 00:25:36,000
, 00:25:36:00 , The interiors are studio sets,
305
00:25:36,000 --> 00:25:39,000
, 00:25:39:00 , typical Warner Bros. Art Deco,
306
00:25:39,000 --> 00:25:42,130
, 00:25:42:00 , as are some of the exteriors.
307
00:25:42,130 --> 00:25:48,000
, 00:25:45:13 , Wright had left out the swimming pool.
308
00:25:48,000 --> 00:25:51,130
, 00:25:51:13 , William Castle rediscovered it in 1958,
309
00:25:51,130 --> 00:26:00,130
, 00:25:54:00 , just before Wright's death.
310
00:26:00,130 --> 00:26:04,000
, 00:26:04:00 , Vincent Price has offered $10,000 to five people
311
00:26:04,000 --> 00:26:12,000
, 00:26:08:00 , if they can last the night in this century-old haunted house.
312
00:26:12,000 --> 00:26:36,130
, 00:26:17:13 , Once again, the interiors are unrelated to Wright's architecture.
313
00:26:36,130 --> 00:26:44,130
, 00:26:41:00 , In 1968 Gus Brown bought the Ennis house and restored it.
314
00:26:44,130 --> 00:26:47,130
, 00:26:47:13 , To help pay the maintenance and preservation costs,
315
00:26:47,130 --> 00:26:51,000
, 00:26:51:00 , he began promoting it as a location site,
316
00:26:51,000 --> 00:26:53,000
, 00:26:53:00 , not only for movies and TV shows,
317
00:26:53,000 --> 00:27:11,000
, 00:26:56:13 , but also for infomercials and music videos.
318
00:27:11,000 --> 00:27:16,000
, 00:27:14:00 , Blade Runner was his proudest catch,
319
00:27:16,000 --> 00:27:19,000
, 00:27:19:00 , but my favorite is A Passion to Kill,
320
00:27:19,000 --> 00:27:22,000
, 00:27:22:00 , a low-budget neo-noir film.
321
00:27:22,000 --> 00:27:24,000
, 00:27:24:00 , It plays a psychiatric clinic
322
00:27:24,000 --> 00:27:42,000
, 00:27:28:00 , where a patient can sometimes seduce her therapist.
323
00:27:42,000 --> 00:27:49,000
, 00:27:47:00 , But director Rick King allows the architecture to upstage the action.
324
00:27:49,000 --> 00:27:54,000
, 00:27:53:00 , The Ennis house apparently transcends space and time.
325
00:27:54,000 --> 00:27:57,130
, 00:27:57:00 , It could be fictionally located in Washington
326
00:27:57,130 --> 00:28:02,000
, 00:27:59:13 , or Osaka.
327
00:28:02,000 --> 00:28:08,000
, 00:28:04:00 , It could play an ancient villa...
328
00:28:08,000 --> 00:28:13,130
, 00:28:11:00 , a nineteenth century haunted house...
329
00:28:13,130 --> 00:28:18,130
, 00:28:16:00 , a contemporary mansion...
330
00:28:18,130 --> 00:28:25,000
, 00:28:21:00 , a twenty-first century apartment building...
331
00:28:25,000 --> 00:28:28,000
, 00:28:28:00 , or a twenty-sixth century science lab
332
00:28:28,000 --> 00:28:32,000
, 00:28:31:00 , where Klaus Kinski invents time travel.
333
00:28:32,000 --> 00:28:34,130
, 00:28:34:13 , "I got my blood into this...
334
00:28:34,130 --> 00:28:36,000
, 00:28:36:00 , And now you have it...
335
00:28:36,000 --> 00:28:38,000
, 00:28:38:00 , Look, right in the palm of my hand.
336
00:28:38,000 --> 00:28:40,000
, 00:28:40:00 , Time!
337
00:28:40,000 --> 00:28:48,130
, 00:28:44:00 , We can go back into the past and change it as we wish."
338
00:28:48,130 --> 00:28:53,000
, 00:28:52:00 , The Union Station is a more recognizable landmark.
339
00:28:53,000 --> 00:28:56,130
, 00:28:56:00 , As the major gateway to Los Angeles in the forties and fifties,
340
00:28:56,130 --> 00:29:00,000
, 00:28:59:00 , it has been a location for many movies
341
00:29:00,000 --> 00:29:05,130
, 00:29:03:00 , and a favorite site for movie kidnappings.
342
00:29:05,130 --> 00:29:09,000
, 00:29:07:13 , "Listen, madam."
343
00:29:09,000 --> 00:29:10,130
, 00:29:10:13 , "You stole that."
344
00:29:10,130 --> 00:29:12,130
, 00:29:12:13 , "Know what this is?"
345
00:29:12,130 --> 00:29:14,130
, 00:29:14:13 , "- It's a game."|"- It's no game. Just walk."
346
00:29:14,130 --> 00:29:18,000
, 00:29:18:00 , "- Why?"|"Cuz if you don't, I'll blow your fucking heart out."
347
00:29:18,000 --> 00:29:21,000
, 00:29:21:00 , Through its corridors and grand lobby have passed
348
00:29:21,000 --> 00:29:25,000
, 00:29:23:00 , gangsters...
349
00:29:25,000 --> 00:29:30,130
, 00:29:27:00 , drug dealers...
350
00:29:30,130 --> 00:29:42,130
, 00:29:33:00 , political protesters...
351
00:29:42,130 --> 00:29:48,000
, 00:29:45:00 , Munchkins...
352
00:29:48,000 --> 00:29:55,000
, 00:29:53:00 , even an alien in heat disguised as a railroad conductor.
353
00:29:55,000 --> 00:29:59,000
, 00:29:58:00 , Yet Union Station hasn't always played itself.
354
00:29:59,000 --> 00:30:02,000
, 00:30:02:00 , During its fallow days in the early eighties,
355
00:30:02,000 --> 00:30:05,130
, 00:30:05:00 , before its revival as an interurban railway hub,
356
00:30:05,130 --> 00:30:10,130
, 00:30:08:00 , it was a police station in Blade Runner.
357
00:30:10,130 --> 00:30:13,000
, 00:30:13:00 , In the 1950 movie Union Station,
358
00:30:13,000 --> 00:30:16,130
, 00:30:16:13 , the only film in which it has a starring role,
359
00:30:16,130 --> 00:30:21,000
, 00:30:19:00 , it is not located in Los Angeles.
360
00:30:21,000 --> 00:30:28,000
, 00:30:24:13 , Actually it's never located anywhere precisely.
361
00:30:28,000 --> 00:30:32,000
, 00:30:31:00 , The station is only a commuter ride from Westhampton,
362
00:30:32,000 --> 00:30:38,000
, 00:30:35:00 , which would place it in New York City,
363
00:30:38,000 --> 00:30:42,000
, 00:30:42:00 , yet one of the villains takes an elevated train out of the station,
364
00:30:42,000 --> 00:30:48,000
, 00:30:45:00 , suggesting Chicago.
365
00:30:48,000 --> 00:30:51,000
, 00:30:51:00 , The police chase him into the stockyards.
366
00:30:51,000 --> 00:30:54,000
, 00:30:53:00 , This must be Chicago,
367
00:30:54,000 --> 00:31:40,000
, 00:30:57:00 , but what about those palm trees?
368
00:31:40,000 --> 00:31:42,000
, 00:31:42:00 , In The Replacement Killers,
369
00:31:42,000 --> 00:31:45,130
, 00:31:45:13 , Union Station played the Los Angeles International Airport,
370
00:31:45,130 --> 00:31:55,000
, 00:31:47:13 , LAX.
371
00:31:55,000 --> 00:31:58,130
, 00:31:58:00 , Our airport is certainly replaceable.
372
00:31:58,130 --> 00:32:02,130
, 00:32:02:00 , The best anyone might say for it is that it looks like all the others,
373
00:32:02,130 --> 00:32:06,000
, 00:32:05:00 , maybe just a little worse.
374
00:32:06,000 --> 00:32:11,000
, 00:32:09:00 , The railway terminal had been designed as public space;
375
00:32:11,000 --> 00:32:17,000
, 00:32:14:00 , the airport was designed for crowd control.
376
00:32:17,000 --> 00:32:22,000
, 00:32:22:00 , It has been an inevitable if uninspiring location for movies set in Los Angeles,
377
00:32:22,000 --> 00:32:28,000
, 00:32:27:00 , but some directors have tried to sidestep its terminal blandness.
378
00:32:28,000 --> 00:32:31,000
, 00:32:31:00 , Clint Eastwood set The Rookie in Los Angeles,
379
00:32:31,000 --> 00:32:47,000
, 00:32:37:00 , but he filmed the climactic airport terminal chase at the San Jose International Airport.
380
00:32:47,000 --> 00:32:49,130
, 00:32:49:13 , In Why Do Fools Fall in Love?,
381
00:32:49,130 --> 00:32:53,000
, 00:32:53:00 , the "theme" restaurant in the middle of the airport parking lot,
382
00:32:53,000 --> 00:32:57,000
, 00:32:56:00 , originally intended as the control tower,
383
00:32:57,000 --> 00:33:13,130
, 00:33:00:00 , portrayed a passenger terminal.
384
00:33:13,130 --> 00:33:16,130
, 00:33:16:13 , Of course movies lie about Los Angeles,
385
00:33:16,130 --> 00:33:24,130
, 00:33:21:00 , but sometimes they make us wish the real city corresponded more closely to their vision.
386
00:33:24,130 --> 00:33:26,050
, 00:33:26:05 , In Miracle Mile,
387
00:33:26,050 --> 00:33:29,130
, 00:33:29:13 , Johnie's Coffee Shop at Wilshire and Fairfax
388
00:33:29,130 --> 00:33:32,000
, 00:33:32:00 , has a fantastic revolving sign,
389
00:33:32,000 --> 00:33:35,000
, 00:33:34:00 , and it's open all night.
390
00:33:35,000 --> 00:33:37,000
, 00:33:37:00 , At the time the film was made,
391
00:33:37,000 --> 00:33:39,000
, 00:33:39:00 , Johnnie's had no revolving sign,
392
00:33:39,000 --> 00:33:43,000
, 00:33:41:00 , and it closed before dinnertime.
393
00:33:43,000 --> 00:33:48,000
, 00:33:45:00 , Now it's closed indefinitely.
394
00:33:48,000 --> 00:33:50,130
, 00:33:50:00 , Other lies are simply benign.
395
00:33:50,130 --> 00:33:55,000
, 00:33:53:13 , Government agencies sometimes get fictional names.
396
00:33:55,000 --> 00:34:00,130
, 00:33:59:13 , "Dr. Stevens, meet Special Agent Pomeroy of the National Bureau of Investigation."
397
00:34:00,130 --> 00:34:01,200
, 00:34:01:20 , "N.B.I.?"
398
00:34:01,200 --> 00:34:04,130
, 00:34:04:13 , "You don't look like an N.B.I. man to me, Mr. Pomeroy."
399
00:34:04,130 --> 00:34:05,130
, 00:34:07:13 , "Well, you don't look like a doctor, doctor."
400
00:34:05,130 --> 00:34:12,000
, 00:34:09:00 , People have fake addresses.
401
00:34:12,000 --> 00:34:18,130
, 00:34:17:00 , "Stark, Jim Stark. Here it is, 1753 Angelo. Well, well."
402
00:34:18,130 --> 00:34:21,000
, 00:34:20:13 , Or fake phone numbers...
403
00:34:21,000 --> 00:34:24,000
, 00:34:23:13 , "Lexington 0-five-five-four-nine."
404
00:34:24,000 --> 00:34:25,000
, 00:34:25:00 , "What's the number?"
405
00:34:25,000 --> 00:34:27,000
, 00:34:27:00 , "Five-five-five-seven-six-o-five."
406
00:34:27,000 --> 00:34:30,130
, 00:34:30:13 , "Five-five-five-four-four-eight-seven."
407
00:34:30,130 --> 00:34:44,130
, 00:34:34:00 , "Five-five-five-sixty-nine-sixty-nine."
408
00:34:44,130 --> 00:34:46,130
, 00:34:46:13 , "Write down my number, ...
409
00:34:46,130 --> 00:34:51,130
, 00:34:50:13 , five-five-five-six-three-two-one. Got it?"
410
00:34:51,130 --> 00:34:53,000
, 00:34:53:00 , "Wait a minute...
411
00:34:53,000 --> 00:34:57,000
, 00:34:57:00 , Five-five-five's not a real number. They only use that in the movies."
412
00:34:57,000 --> 00:35:03,000
, 00:35:00:00 , "No shit, honey. What do you think this is? Real life?"
413
00:35:03,000 --> 00:35:05,130
, 00:35:05:00 , Other lies are annoying.
414
00:35:05,130 --> 00:35:09,000
, 00:35:08:00 , To someone who knows Los Angeles only from movies,
415
00:35:09,000 --> 00:35:19,000
, 00:35:14:00 , it might appear that everyone who has a job lives in the hills or at the beach.
416
00:35:19,000 --> 00:35:21,130
, 00:35:21:00 , The dismal flatland between
417
00:35:21,130 --> 00:35:27,000
, 00:35:25:00 , is the province exclusively of the lumpen proletariat.
418
00:35:27,000 --> 00:35:51,050
, 00:35:30:00 , And most of them live next to an oil refinery.
419
00:35:51,050 --> 00:36:04,130
, 00:35:55:00 , And in death they will rest next to an oil derrick.
420
00:36:04,130 --> 00:36:20,000
, 00:36:08:00 , A hillside house may be appropriate for a hack composer ...
421
00:36:20,000 --> 00:36:22,000
, 00:36:22:00 , or a drug dealer on the way up.
422
00:36:22,000 --> 00:36:24,000
, 00:36:24:00 , "Where'd you get this furniture?"
423
00:36:24,000 --> 00:36:26,000
, 00:36:26:00 , "Nice Italian lady picked this out."
424
00:36:26,000 --> 00:36:28,000
, 00:36:28:00 , "Oh, so nice. Gianni Versace, right? Mike Tyson wears Versace."
425
00:36:28,000 --> 00:36:33,000
, 00:36:33:00 , "David, come on. Take your feet off the couch. You don't do that at your mother's house, do you?"
426
00:36:33,000 --> 00:36:36,000
, 00:36:36:00 , "Nouveau anal, I think this is called. But all right."
427
00:36:36,000 --> 00:36:38,130
, 00:36:38:00 , "And here...here...here...coaster...coaster."
428
00:36:38,130 --> 00:36:41,130
, 00:36:41:13 , Or a music promoter on the way down.
429
00:36:41,130 --> 00:36:44,000
, 00:36:43:00 , "Terry Valentine."
430
00:36:44,000 --> 00:36:53,130
, 00:36:46:00 , "Very nice to meet you."
431
00:36:53,130 --> 00:36:55,130
, 00:36:54:13 , "You know, ...
432
00:36:55,130 --> 00:36:59,000
, 00:36:58:13 , ...you could see the sea out there if you could see it."
433
00:36:59,000 --> 00:37:05,000
, 00:37:04:13 , But in reality, a bookstore clerk couldn't afford to rent a house above Sunset Plaza,
434
00:37:05,000 --> 00:37:07,000
, 00:37:07:00 , even if it is, as she claims
435
00:37:07,000 --> 00:37:10,000
, 00:37:09:00 , "small and kind of run-down."
436
00:37:10,000 --> 00:37:13,130
, 00:37:13:13 , A fixer with jetliner views, in the local realtor jargon,
437
00:37:13,130 --> 00:37:19,000
, 00:37:18:13 , would still have rented for two or three thousand dollars per month in 1995,
438
00:37:19,000 --> 00:37:23,130
, 00:37:22:00 , no matter how much in need of TLC.
439
00:37:23,130 --> 00:37:28,000
, 00:37:26:13 , Her bank robber boyfriend might live in Malibu.
440
00:37:28,000 --> 00:37:29,130
, 00:37:29:13 , And back in the sixties,
441
00:37:29,130 --> 00:37:32,130
, 00:37:32:13 , bohemian young people did live by the sand in Venice,
442
00:37:32,130 --> 00:37:40,000
, 00:37:35:13 , although I don't remember the Infinite Pad.
443
00:37:40,000 --> 00:37:44,130
, 00:37:44:00 , We may regard Cobra's Venice loft as a relic of the golden eighties
444
00:37:44,130 --> 00:37:48,000
, 00:37:47:13 , when product placement superseded script-writing
445
00:37:48,000 --> 00:38:09,130
, 00:37:53:00 , and movie cops abandoned the suburbs to become urban pioneers.
446
00:38:09,130 --> 00:38:12,000
, 00:38:12:00 , But what about a struggling true-crime writer
447
00:38:12,000 --> 00:38:15,100
, 00:38:15:00 , and an unemployed photographer so cash-strapped
448
00:38:15,100 --> 00:38:23,130
, 00:38:20:00 , they must recruit paying passengers for their move from Pittsburgh to California?
449
00:38:23,130 --> 00:38:26,000
, 00:38:25:14 , Yet when they arrive in Los Angeles,
450
00:38:26,000 --> 00:38:33,000
, 00:38:30:13 , they immediately take up residence in a spacious Malibu beach cottage.
451
00:38:33,000 --> 00:38:36,150
, 00:38:35:00 , And I don't like geographic license.
452
00:38:36,150 --> 00:38:40,000
, 00:38:39:10 , It's hard to make a theoretical argument against it.
453
00:38:40,000 --> 00:38:42,000
, 00:38:42:00 , After all, in a fiction film,
454
00:38:42,000 --> 00:38:45,000
, 00:38:44:00 , a real space becomes fictional.
455
00:38:45,000 --> 00:38:49,000
, 00:38:48:13 , Why shouldn't a car chase jump from the Venice canals
456
00:38:49,000 --> 00:39:16,000
, 00:38:52:00 , to the Los Angeles harbor thirty miles away?
457
00:39:16,000 --> 00:39:19,000
, 00:39:19:00 , Why shouldn't the exit from a skating rink in Westwood
458
00:39:19,000 --> 00:39:23,000
, 00:39:23:00 , open directly onto Fletcher Bowron Square in downtown Los Angeles,
459
00:39:23,000 --> 00:39:27,130
, 00:39:25:00 , fifteen miles east?
460
00:39:27,130 --> 00:39:39,000
, 00:39:31:00 , But one fiction is not always as good as another,
461
00:39:39,000 --> 00:39:40,130
, 00:39:40:13 , and like dramatic license,
462
00:39:40,130 --> 00:39:45,000
, 00:39:44:00 , geographic license is usually an alibi for laziness.
463
00:39:45,000 --> 00:39:49,000
, 00:39:48:00 , Silly geography makes for silly movies.
464
00:39:49,000 --> 00:40:00,130
, 00:39:52:00 , "I warned you I'd kill her."
465
00:40:00,130 --> 00:40:03,000
, 00:40:03:00 , And the best Los Angeles car chase movie
466
00:40:03,000 --> 00:40:04,130
, 00:40:04:13 , is stubbornly,
467
00:40:04,130 --> 00:40:07,130
, 00:40:06:13 , even perversely literalist
468
00:40:07,130 --> 00:40:08,130
, 00:40:08:13 , "Attention, all units. ...
469
00:40:08,130 --> 00:40:12,000
, 00:40:12:00 , ... Roadblock being set up at Torrance Mazda agency, ...
470
00:40:12,000 --> 00:40:14,000
, 00:40:14:00 , One-Nine-O street and Hawthorne Boulevard.
471
00:40:14,000 --> 00:40:35,000
, 00:40:15:13 , Use caution."
472
00:40:35,000 --> 00:40:39,000
, 00:40:38:13 , Director Toby Halicki realized Dziga Vertov's dream:
473
00:40:39,000 --> 00:40:47,000
, 00:40:42:13 , an anti-humanist cinema of bodies and machines in motion.
474
00:40:47,000 --> 00:40:50,000
, 00:40:50:00 , His materialist masterpiece was the first manifesto
475
00:40:50,000 --> 00:41:01,000
, 00:40:53:00 , for a cinema of conspicuous destruction.
476
00:41:01,000 --> 00:41:03,000
, 00:41:03:00 , centered in the South Bay,
477
00:41:03,000 --> 00:41:07,000
, 00:41:07:00 , the unglamorous southern coastal region of the Los Angeles basin
478
00:41:07,000 --> 00:41:10,130
, 00:41:09:13 , stretching from Long Beach to El Segundo
479
00:41:10,130 --> 00:41:16,130
, 00:41:14:00 , that would later become the domain of William Friedkin...
480
00:41:16,130 --> 00:41:19,130
, 00:41:19:00 , Quentin Tarantino...
481
00:41:19,130 --> 00:41:21,000
, 00:41:21:00 , and Michael Mann,
482
00:41:21,000 --> 00:41:26,000
, 00:41:24:13 , who would accidentally rename the most familiar icon of South Bay movies,
483
00:41:26,000 --> 00:41:30,000
, 00:41:28:00 , the Vincent Thomas Bridge.
484
00:41:30,000 --> 00:41:34,000
, 00:41:33:00 , "Saint Vincent Thomas Bridge, that's escape route number one."
485
00:41:34,000 --> 00:41:39,000
, 00:41:38:00 , Vincent Thomas was San Pedro's representative in the state assembly for many years,
486
00:41:39,000 --> 00:41:42,000
, 00:41:41:00 , but he hasn't been canonized yet,
487
00:41:42,000 --> 00:41:47,000
, 00:41:44:00 , not even in Pedro.
488
00:41:47,000 --> 00:41:48,130
, 00:41:48:13 , Accidents happen,
489
00:41:48,130 --> 00:41:52,000
, 00:41:50:13 , but some lies are malignant.
490
00:41:52,000 --> 00:41:57,000
, 00:41:54:13 , They cheapen or trivialize the real city.
491
00:41:57,000 --> 00:42:02,130
, 00:42:01:00 , One of the glories of Los Angeles is its modernist residential architecture,
492
00:42:02,130 --> 00:42:07,000
, 00:42:07:00 , but Hollywood movies have almost systematically denigrated this heritage
493
00:42:07,000 --> 00:42:09,060
, 00:42:09:00 , by casting many of these houses
494
00:42:09,060 --> 00:42:14,000
, 00:42:11:06 , as the residences of movie villains.
495
00:42:14,000 --> 00:42:18,000
, 00:42:17:00 , It begins with The Damned Don't Cry in 1950.
496
00:42:18,000 --> 00:42:21,000
, 00:42:20:00 , Frank Sinatra's Palm Springs retreat,
497
00:42:21,000 --> 00:42:23,000
, 00:42:23:00 , designed by Stewart Williams,
498
00:42:23,000 --> 00:42:29,130
, 00:42:26:00 , plays the home of a local gangster boss.
499
00:42:29,130 --> 00:42:32,000
, 00:42:31:16 , Then in 1955,
500
00:42:32,000 --> 00:42:35,000
, 00:42:35:00 , a band of psycho kidnappers led by John Cassavetes
501
00:42:35,000 --> 00:42:39,000
, 00:42:39:00 , holes up in a prototypically mid-century modern house
502
00:42:39,000 --> 00:42:57,000
, 00:42:41:00 , in the Hollywood Hills.
503
00:42:57,000 --> 00:43:02,000
, 00:43:00:13 , And there has usually been something sinister about the Ennis house.
504
00:43:02,000 --> 00:43:06,000
, 00:43:06:00 , Its most frequent role is the mansion of some gangster chieftain,
505
00:43:06,000 --> 00:43:15,130
, 00:43:09:00 , often a representative of the yellow peril.
506
00:43:15,130 --> 00:43:20,000
, 00:43:20:00 , The most celebrated episode in Hollywood's war against modern architecture
507
00:43:20,000 --> 00:43:24,000
, 00:43:22:00 , is L.A. Confidential.
508
00:43:24,000 --> 00:43:26,080
, 00:43:26:00 , Richard Neutra's Lovell house,
509
00:43:26,080 --> 00:43:31,000
, 00:43:31:00 , the first great manifestation of the International Style in southern California,
510
00:43:31,000 --> 00:43:33,130
, 00:43:33:00 , plays the home of Pierce Patchett,
511
00:43:33,130 --> 00:43:35,000
, 00:43:35:00 , pornographer,
512
00:43:35,000 --> 00:43:36,000
, 00:43:36:00 , pimp,
513
00:43:36,000 --> 00:43:38,000
, 00:43:38:00 , prince of the shadow city
514
00:43:38,000 --> 00:43:42,000
, 00:43:40:13 , where whatever you desire is for sale.
515
00:43:42,000 --> 00:43:46,100
, 00:43:46:00 , Actually director Curtis Hanson greatly admires the Lovell house.
516
00:43:46,100 --> 00:43:50,000
, 00:43:49:13 , He even gives it a special credit at the end of the film,
517
00:43:50,000 --> 00:43:54,000
, 00:43:53:13 , according it the honorific title favored by its original owner:
518
00:43:54,000 --> 00:43:56,000
, 00:43:56:00 , the Lovell Health House.
519
00:43:56,000 --> 00:43:58,000
, 00:43:58:00 , Is it just a convention then?
520
00:43:58,000 --> 00:44:00,000
, 00:44:00:00 , The architectural trophy house
521
00:44:00,000 --> 00:44:04,000
, 00:44:04:00 , is the modern equivalent of the black hat|or the mustache.
522
00:44:04,000 --> 00:44:07,000
, 00:44:06:00 , It's nothing to take seriously.
523
00:44:07,000 --> 00:44:13,060
, 00:44:11:00 , Well, the architecture critic of the Los Angeles Times took it seriously.
524
00:44:13,060 --> 00:44:16,000
, 00:44:16:00 , He cited L.A. Confidential as some kind of proof
525
00:44:16,000 --> 00:44:24,000
, 00:44:20:13 , that the utopian aspirations of modernist architecture were bogus
526
00:44:24,000 --> 00:44:25,000
, 00:44:25:00 , He wrote,
527
00:44:25,000 --> 00:44:30,000
, 00:44:30:00 , "The house's slick, meticulous forms seem the perfect frame for that kind of power...
528
00:44:30,000 --> 00:44:35,000
, 00:44:34:00 , Neutra's glass walls open up to expose the dark side of our lives
529
00:44:35,000 --> 00:44:41,130
, 00:44:39:00 , they suggest the erotic, the broken, the psychologically impure."
530
00:44:41,130 --> 00:44:43,130
, 00:44:43:13 , So now we know.
531
00:44:43,130 --> 00:44:45,000
, 00:44:45:00 , As the movies have shown,
532
00:44:45,000 --> 00:44:50,130
, 00:44:49:00 , these pure modern machines for better living were dens of vice.
533
00:44:50,130 --> 00:44:51,130
, 00:44:51:13 , In fact,
534
00:44:51,130 --> 00:44:56,000
, 00:44:56:00 , this fiction is contradicted not only by the original spirit of the Lovell house,
535
00:44:56,000 --> 00:44:59,000
, 00:44:58:00 , but by its entire history.
536
00:44:59,000 --> 00:45:02,130
, 00:45:02:13 , It was designed as a kind of manifesto for natural living,
537
00:45:02,130 --> 00:45:11,130
, 00:45:06:13 , and it became a center for radical left-wing political meetings in the thirties.
538
00:45:11,130 --> 00:45:15,130
, 00:45:15:00 , There is one modernist architect Hollywood lets off lightly:
539
00:45:15,130 --> 00:45:17,000
, 00:45:17:00 , Pierre Koenig.
540
00:45:17,000 --> 00:45:21,000
, 00:45:21:00 , Perhaps it's because he had a knack for turning steel-and-glass cubes
541
00:45:21,000 --> 00:45:24,000
, 00:45:24:00 , into Hollywood Regency style mini-mansions.
542
00:45:24,000 --> 00:45:27,000
, 00:45:27:00 , His Stahl house is an icon of modern architecture
543
00:45:27,000 --> 00:45:32,130
, 00:45:30:00 , and lately a movie star.
544
00:45:32,130 --> 00:45:34,000
, 00:45:34:00 , In The Marrying Man,
545
00:45:34,000 --> 00:45:38,130
, 00:45:38:13 , it plays the Hollywood pied-Ă -terre of a multimillionaire playboy,
546
00:45:38,130 --> 00:45:43,130
, 00:45:42:13 , although the film is set twelve years before it was built.
547
00:45:43,130 --> 00:45:45,050
, 00:45:45:00 , In The First Power,
548
00:45:45,050 --> 00:45:49,000
, 00:45:47:13 , it plays the home of a police psychic,
549
00:45:49,000 --> 00:45:52,000
, 00:45:52:00 , and in Why Do Fools Fall in Love?
550
00:45:52,000 --> 00:45:55,000
, 00:45:55:00 , it is the west coast base of Zola Taylor,
551
00:45:55,000 --> 00:46:00,130
, 00:45:57:00 , the female vocalist in the Platters.
552
00:46:00,130 --> 00:46:09,130
, 00:46:04:00 , We feel bad when Frankie Lymon trashes it.
553
00:46:09,130 --> 00:46:11,000
, 00:46:11:00 , On the other hand,
554
00:46:11,000 --> 00:46:16,130
, 00:46:15:00 , the architect Hollywood most loves to hate is John Lautner.
555
00:46:16,130 --> 00:46:17,200
, 00:46:17:20 , In Twilight,
556
00:46:17,200 --> 00:46:21,000
, 00:46:21:00 , a Lautner house overlooking the San Fernando Valley
557
00:46:21,000 --> 00:46:28,130
, 00:46:24:00 , is a crooked cop's reward for his corruption.
558
00:46:28,130 --> 00:46:31,130
, 00:46:31:00 , "Nice place you got here...
559
00:46:31,130 --> 00:46:35,000
, 00:46:33:18 , ... It sure beats Los Feliz"
560
00:46:35,000 --> 00:46:37,130
, 00:46:37:00 , "You're up above the smog."
561
00:46:37,130 --> 00:46:40,000
, 00:46:40:05 , "Quite a pad you got here, man."
562
00:46:40,000 --> 00:46:43,000
, 00:46:43:00 , A more elaborate Lautner house in the hills of Beverly
563
00:46:43,000 --> 00:46:46,000
, 00:46:46:00 , plays the Malibu beach house of porn king Jackie Treehorn
564
00:46:46,000 --> 00:46:48,000
, 00:46:48:00 , in The Big Lebowski.
565
00:46:48,000 --> 00:46:51,000
, 00:46:50:13 , "How's the smut business, Jackie?"
566
00:46:51,000 --> 00:46:55,000
, 00:46:54:13 , "I wouldn't know, dude. I deal in publishing."
567
00:46:55,000 --> 00:46:58,000
, 00:46:58:00 , Lautner's most famous house is the Chemosphere,
568
00:46:58,000 --> 00:47:01,000
, 00:47:01:00 , a hexagon of wood, steel, and glass,
569
00:47:01,000 --> 00:47:07,130
, 00:47:06:00 , raised above its hillside lot on a single concrete column.
570
00:47:07,130 --> 00:47:09,130
, 00:47:09:13 , It appears in Body Double
571
00:47:09,130 --> 00:47:15,000
, 00:47:12:13 , as the bachelor pad of a lunatic driller killer.
572
00:47:15,000 --> 00:47:17,130
, 00:47:17:13 , Lautner's interiors may be sometimes vulgar,
573
00:47:17,130 --> 00:47:20,000
, 00:47:20:00 , or excessively ostentatious,
574
00:47:20,000 --> 00:47:22,000
, 00:47:22:00 , but he can't be blamed for this one,
575
00:47:22,000 --> 00:47:33,000
, 00:47:27:00 , a bit of excessive art direction designed to parody eighties excesses.
576
00:47:33,000 --> 00:47:38,000
, 00:47:37:00 , The ultimate insult to Lautner's work came in Lethal Weapon 2.
577
00:47:38,000 --> 00:47:40,000
, 00:47:40:00 , The Garcia house on Mulholland
578
00:47:40,000 --> 00:47:45,130
, 00:47:45:00 , is the home office of a drug ring organized by the South African consulate.
579
00:47:45,130 --> 00:47:48,000
, 00:47:47:14 , Enraged by their diplomatic immunity,
580
00:47:48,000 --> 00:47:53,130
, 00:47:51:13 , Mel Gibson pulls down their house with his pickup truck.
581
00:47:53,130 --> 00:47:57,000
, 00:47:56:13 , Not only is Lautner slick and superficial,
582
00:47:57,000 --> 00:48:00,000
, 00:47:59:00 , he's incompetent.
583
00:48:00,000 --> 00:48:04,130
, 00:48:04:00 , Lethal Weapon 2 is also the work of a modern architecture fan.
584
00:48:04,130 --> 00:48:09,130
, 00:48:09:13 , Producer Joel Silver is famous for his tasteful restoration of a Frank Lloyd Wright house in Hollywood
585
00:48:09,130 --> 00:48:15,000
, 00:48:13:13 , and a Wright-designed plantation in South Carolina.
586
00:48:15,000 --> 00:48:18,000
, 00:48:18:00 , Even though Lautner was Wright's disciple,
587
00:48:18,000 --> 00:48:38,130
, 00:48:22:13 , Hollywood's conventional ideology once again trumped personal conviction.
588
00:48:38,130 --> 00:48:45,000
, 00:48:42:00 , At least Silver has also trashed post-modernist architecture.
589
00:48:45,000 --> 00:48:47,130
, 00:48:47:13 , The thirty-four-story Fox Plaza in Century City
590
00:48:47,130 --> 00:48:55,130
, 00:48:50:00 , co-starred with Bruce Willis in Die Hard.
591
00:48:55,130 --> 00:48:57,130
, 00:48:57:13 , When a gang of high-stakes robbers
592
00:48:57,130 --> 00:49:02,000
, 00:49:02:00 , posing as terrorists take over the building and capture thirty plus hostages,
593
00:49:02,000 --> 00:49:05,000
, 00:49:05:00 , the FBI would sacrifice a good number of the hostages
594
00:49:05,000 --> 00:49:07,130
, 00:49:07:00 , in order to save the building.
595
00:49:07,130 --> 00:49:09,130
, 00:49:09:13 , "What you figure the breakage?"
596
00:49:09,130 --> 00:49:12,000
, 00:49:12:00 , "I figure we take out the terrorists,...
597
00:49:12,000 --> 00:49:15,130
, 00:49:15:00 , ... lose twenty, twenty-five per cent of the hostages. Tops."
598
00:49:15,130 --> 00:49:19,130
, 00:49:17:00 , "I can live with that."
599
00:49:19,130 --> 00:49:26,000
, 00:49:22:00 , But the rogue cop inside has other ideas.
600
00:49:26,000 --> 00:49:28,130
, 00:49:28:13 , Among all the authority figures on the scene,
601
00:49:28,130 --> 00:49:30,130
, 00:49:30:13 , he alone places people above property.
602
00:49:30,130 --> 00:49:33,130
, 00:49:33:00 , "Get down, get the fuck down!"
603
00:49:33,130 --> 00:49:55,000
, 00:49:35:13 , "Nail that sucker."
604
00:49:55,000 --> 00:49:58,000
, 00:49:58:00 , The Fox Plaza played the Nakatomi Plaza,
605
00:49:58,000 --> 00:50:02,130
, 00:50:01:00 , the Los Angeles branch office of a Japanese multinational.
606
00:50:02,130 --> 00:50:04,000
, 00:50:04:00 , In the late eighties,
607
00:50:04,000 --> 00:50:10,130
, 00:50:07:13 , Japanese corporations did own many of the local office towers.
608
00:50:10,130 --> 00:50:26,000
, 00:50:13:00 , In the movies, they owned them all.
609
00:50:26,000 --> 00:50:32,000
, 00:50:30:00 , "Jesus, if an elevator's gonna talk, it should speak in American."
610
00:50:32,000 --> 00:50:37,130
, 00:50:36:13 , There are a few Los Angeles landmarks that almost always play themselves:
611
00:50:37,130 --> 00:50:39,130
, 00:50:39:00 , City Hall...
612
00:50:39,130 --> 00:50:43,000
, 00:50:41:13 , Grauman's Chinese Theatre...
613
00:50:43,000 --> 00:50:46,000
, 00:50:45:00 , Griffith Planetarium...
614
00:50:46,000 --> 00:50:49,130
, 00:50:48:00 , the four-level freeway interchange...
615
00:50:49,130 --> 00:50:58,000
, 00:50:52:00 , the concrete channel of the Los Angeles River...
616
00:50:58,000 --> 00:51:06,130
, 00:51:01:00 , the Eastern Columbia Building at Eighth and Broadway...
617
00:51:06,130 --> 00:51:11,130
, 00:51:09:00 , the Bonaventure Hotel at Fifth and Figueroa...
618
00:51:11,130 --> 00:51:15,130
, 00:51:14:00 , the Beverly Hills Hotel at Sunset and Rodeo,
619
00:51:15,130 --> 00:51:20,130
, 00:51:18:00 , the Paradise Motel at Sunset and Beaudry...
620
00:51:20,130 --> 00:51:29,000
, 00:51:23:00 , Clayton Plumbers at Westwood and LaGrange...
621
00:51:29,000 --> 00:51:35,130
, 00:51:32:00 , Circus Liquor at Burbank and Vineland...
622
00:51:35,130 --> 00:51:42,130
, 00:51:38:00 , Pink's Hot Dogs at La Brea and Melrose...
623
00:51:42,130 --> 00:51:55,000
, 00:51:45:00 , the Memorial Coliseum in Exposition Park.
624
00:51:55,000 --> 00:51:57,000
, 00:51:57:00 , With hard wooden seats for all,
625
00:51:57,000 --> 00:52:01,000
, 00:52:00:13 , the Coliseum is the most democratic American stadium
626
00:52:01,000 --> 00:52:04,130
, 00:52:03:13 , and the last of its kind to survive.
627
00:52:04,130 --> 00:52:14,000
, 00:52:07:00 , As a place where thousands of people congregate,
628
00:52:14,000 --> 00:52:17,000
, 00:52:17:00 , like the enigmatic sniper in Two-Minute Warning
629
00:52:17,000 --> 00:52:37,130
, 00:52:19:13 , with a perfect aim for aging movie stars,
630
00:52:37,130 --> 00:52:41,130
, 00:52:41:13 , or the ?invisible invaders" in Edward L. Cahn's 1959 film
631
00:52:41,130 --> 00:52:45,130
, 00:52:45:13 , who utilize a zombie to commandeer the public-address system
632
00:52:45,130 --> 00:52:51,130
, 00:52:48:13 , and deliver one of their laconic ultimatums.
633
00:52:51,130 --> 00:52:54,000
, 00:52:53:00 , "People of earth, ...
634
00:52:54,000 --> 00:52:56,130
, 00:52:56:00 , ... this is your last warning.
635
00:52:56,130 --> 00:53:02,130
, 00:53:02:13 , Unless the nations of your planet surrender immediately,
636
00:53:02,130 --> 00:53:17,000
, 00:53:05:00 , ...all human lives will be destroyed."
637
00:53:17,000 --> 00:53:23,000
, 00:53:20:00 , And, of course, there's the Hollywood sign.
638
00:53:23,000 --> 00:53:28,130
, 00:53:27:13 , Since it marks quite literally the ascendancy of Hollywood over the rest of Los Angeles,
639
00:53:28,130 --> 00:53:30,130
, 00:53:30:13 , I should despise it,
640
00:53:30,130 --> 00:53:33,000
, 00:53:33:00 , as I despise the Hollywood Walk of Fame,
641
00:53:33,000 --> 00:53:37,000
, 00:53:37:00 , where the stars cost the honorees or their sponsors $15,000,
642
00:53:37,000 --> 00:53:41,000
, 00:53:40:00 , where the Hollywood Blacklist still lives.
643
00:53:41,000 --> 00:53:45,000
, 00:53:44:00 , There are stars for the enforcers
644
00:53:45,000 --> 00:53:49,000
, 00:53:47:00 , and the informers,
645
00:53:49,000 --> 00:53:53,000
, 00:53:52:00 , but none for those they informed on.
646
00:53:53,000 --> 00:54:02,130
, 00:53:56:00 , It should be called the Hollywood Walk of Shame.
647
00:54:02,130 --> 00:54:07,130
, 00:54:07:00 , Maybe I find it poignant that a decayed advertisement for a real estate development
648
00:54:07,130 --> 00:54:11,000
, 00:54:09:13 , could become a civic landmark.
649
00:54:11,000 --> 00:54:13,000
, 00:54:13:00 , Or maybe it's just that we have to love it
650
00:54:13,000 --> 00:54:16,130
, 00:54:16:00 , because it's such a fat target for outsiders.
651
00:54:16,130 --> 00:54:19,000
, 00:54:19:00 , Like that expatriate Englishman David Thomson,
652
00:54:19,000 --> 00:54:22,000
, 00:54:22:00 , who loves everything about America
653
00:54:22,000 --> 00:54:25,000
, 00:54:24:00 , except what's worth loving.
654
00:54:25,000 --> 00:54:29,000
, 00:54:27:23 , He loves Hollywood, but not the Hollywood sign.
655
00:54:29,000 --> 00:54:30,130
, 00:54:30:13 , He once wrote:
656
00:54:30,130 --> 00:54:34,000
, 00:54:34:00 , "That HOLLYWOOD sign is so endlessly funny, and dreadful, ...
657
00:54:34,000 --> 00:54:41,000
, 00:54:36:00 , and L.A. is proud of it."
658
00:54:41,000 --> 00:55:30,000
, 00:54:45:00 , These are the landmarks that are destroyed in disaster movies.
659
00:55:30,000 --> 00:55:34,000
, 00:55:33:00 , Whenever the legitimacy of authority comes into question,
660
00:55:34,000 --> 00:55:37,000
, 00:55:36:00 , Hollywood responds with disaster movies.
661
00:55:37,000 --> 00:55:39,130
, 00:55:39:13 , And whenever there's a disaster movie,
662
00:55:39,130 --> 00:55:41,130
, 00:55:41:00 , there's George Kennedy.
663
00:55:41,130 --> 00:55:42,130
, 00:55:42:13 , "Rosa, let's go."
664
00:55:42,130 --> 00:55:54,130
, 00:55:44:00 , "Better not,"
665
00:55:54,130 --> 00:55:58,000
, 00:55:57:13 , "Come on, Rosa. Come on, settle down will ya?"
666
00:55:58,000 --> 00:56:04,130
, 00:56:01:00 , "Earthquakes bring out the worst in some guys, that's all."
667
00:56:04,130 --> 00:56:09,000
, 00:56:08:00 , Disaster movies remind us how foolish and helpless we really are
668
00:56:09,000 --> 00:56:12,000
, 00:56:12:00 , and thus demonstrate our need for professionals
669
00:56:12,000 --> 00:56:16,000
, 00:56:14:00 , and experts to save us from ourselves.
670
00:56:16,000 --> 00:56:31,000
, 00:56:19:00 , They define the sources of legitimate authority.
671
00:56:31,000 --> 00:56:33,000
, 00:56:33:00 , We must depend on specialists,
672
00:56:33,000 --> 00:56:36,000
, 00:56:35:00 , but which ones can we trust?
673
00:56:36,000 --> 00:56:39,000
, 00:56:38:00 , "I got through. ...
674
00:56:39,000 --> 00:56:41,050
, 00:56:41:05 , ...Can you get me a jack hammer and a bolt cutter?"
675
00:56:41,050 --> 00:56:44,000
, 00:56:44:00 , "Use a jack hammer and then the roof will fall in."
676
00:56:44,000 --> 00:56:46,000
, 00:56:46:00 , "Look, I think there are some people alive in there ...
677
00:56:46,000 --> 00:56:47,130
, 00:56:47:13 , ...and I'm gonna try and get them out."
678
00:56:47,130 --> 00:56:50,000
, 00:56:50:00 , "Well, nobody else is and you can't do it all alone."
679
00:56:50,000 --> 00:56:52,000
, 00:56:52:00 , "I won't be alone, ...
680
00:56:52,000 --> 00:57:02,000
, 00:56:54:00 , ...he's coming with me."
681
00:57:02,000 --> 00:57:04,000
, 00:57:04:00 , A priest can be useful.
682
00:57:04,000 --> 00:57:09,130
, 00:57:07:00 , "We're gonna crash, we're gonna be killed, I know we're all gonna be..."
683
00:57:09,130 --> 00:57:11,000
, 00:57:11:00 , But not a politician.
684
00:57:11,000 --> 00:57:13,000
, 00:57:13:00 , "Like the mighty fist of God, ...
685
00:57:13,000 --> 00:57:16,000
, 00:57:16:00 , ...Armageddon will descend upon the city of Los Angeles,...
686
00:57:16,000 --> 00:57:20,000
, 00:57:20:00 , ... the city of sin, the city of Gomorroh, the city of Sodom.
687
00:57:20,000 --> 00:57:25,000
, 00:57:24:13 , ... And waters will arise and separate this sinful, sinful city ...
688
00:57:25,000 --> 00:57:33,000
, 00:57:27:00 , ... from our country."
689
00:57:33,000 --> 00:57:38,000
, 00:57:38:00 , Mike Davis has claimed that Hollywood takes a special pleasure in destroying Los Angeles,
690
00:57:38,000 --> 00:57:42,130
, 00:57:41:00 , a guilty pleasure shared by most of its audience.
691
00:57:42,130 --> 00:57:47,000
, 00:57:47:00 , The entire world seems to be rooting for Los Angeles to slide into the Pacific
692
00:57:47,000 --> 00:57:57,130
, 00:57:49:13 , or be swallowed by the San Andreas fault.
693
00:57:57,130 --> 00:57:58,130
, 00:57:58:13 , In Independence Day,
694
00:57:58,130 --> 00:58:01,130
, 00:58:01:00 , who could identify with the caricatured mob...
695
00:58:01,130 --> 00:58:06,000
, 00:58:05:00 , dancing in idiot ecstasy...to greet the extraterrestrials?
696
00:58:06,000 --> 00:58:08,130
, 00:58:08:13 , There is a comic undertone of 'good riddance'
697
00:58:08,130 --> 00:58:44,000
, 00:58:13:00 , when kooks like these are vaporized by the earth's latest ill-mannered guests.
698
00:58:44,000 --> 00:58:47,000
, 00:58:47:00 , But to me the casual sacrifice of Paris in Armageddon
699
00:58:47,000 --> 00:58:49,130
, 00:58:49:00 , seems even crasser.
700
00:58:49,130 --> 00:58:54,130
, 00:58:53:13 , Are the French being singled out for punishment because they admire Jerry Lewis too much?
701
00:58:54,130 --> 00:59:10,000
, 00:58:58:00 , Or because they have resisted Hollywood's cultural imperialism too fervently?
702
00:59:10,000 --> 00:59:15,130
, 00:59:14:00 , In a sense, Hollywood's frequent destruction of Los Angeles is just as crass,
703
00:59:15,130 --> 00:59:21,000
, 00:59:20:00 , but it's more often a case of economic expediency than of ideology.
704
00:59:21,000 --> 00:59:26,110
, 00:59:24:00 , Hollywood destroys Los Angeles because it's there.
705
00:59:26,110 --> 00:59:29,130
, 00:59:29:13 , Our film-makers don't really believe the Los Angeles City Hall is
706
00:59:29,130 --> 00:59:33,130
, 00:59:33:00 , a more resonant civic symbol than the Empire State Building.
707
00:59:33,130 --> 00:59:52,000
, 00:59:35:13 , But they are well aware that it's closer.
708
00:59:52,000 --> 00:59:57,000
, 00:59:54:13 , "This used to be a hell of a town, officer."
709
00:59:57,000 --> 01:00:03,130
, 00:59:58:00 , "Yeah."
710
01:00:03,130 --> 01:00:05,000
, 01:00:05:00 , In disaster movies,
711
01:00:05,000 --> 01:00:19,230
, 01:00:08:00 , at least Los Angeles is finally there as a character,
712
01:00:19,230 --> 01:00:26,130
, 01:00:22:13 , The City as Character
713
01:00:26,130 --> 01:00:29,000
, 01:00:28:13 , James M. Cain and Raymond Chandler
714
01:00:29,000 --> 01:00:32,000
, 01:00:31:13 , had made Los Angeles a character in their novels,
715
01:00:32,000 --> 01:00:34,000
, 01:00:34:00 , and it became a character for the movies
716
01:00:34,000 --> 01:00:37,000
, 01:00:36:20 , when Chandler and Billy Wilder adapted Cain's novel,
717
01:00:37,000 --> 01:00:41,000
, 01:00:39:00 , Double Indemnity.
718
01:00:41,000 --> 01:00:45,130
, 01:00:45:00 , The sense of place was so precise that Richard Schickel would later claim,
719
01:00:45,130 --> 01:00:54,000
, 01:00:49:13 , "You could charge L.A. as a co-conspirator in the crimes this movie relates."
720
01:00:54,000 --> 01:00:56,000
, 01:00:56:00 , Departing from Cain's text,
721
01:00:56,000 --> 01:00:59,000
, 01:00:59:00 , Chandler and Wilder created a protagonist-narrator
722
01:00:59,000 --> 01:01:04,000
, 01:01:03:00 , who has ideas or at least opinions about the city around him,
723
01:01:04,000 --> 01:01:09,000
, 01:01:08:13 , and his voice-over commentary is addressed to an esteemed colleague whose opinion he cares about
724
01:01:09,000 --> 01:01:15,130
, 01:01:11:13 , and whose intelligence he tries to emulate.
725
01:01:15,130 --> 01:01:18,130
, 01:01:17:00 , "Office memorandum. ...
726
01:01:18,130 --> 01:01:22,130
, 01:01:21:00 , ... Walter Neff to Barton Keyes, claims manager. ...
727
01:01:22,130 --> 01:01:26,130
, 01:01:24:13 , ...Los Angeles. July 16, 1938.
728
01:01:26,130 --> 01:01:29,130
, 01:01:28:00 , Dear Keyes.
729
01:01:29,130 --> 01:01:33,000
, 01:01:32:00 , I suppose you'll call this a confession when you hear it.
730
01:01:33,000 --> 01:01:35,130
, 01:01:35:00 , Well, I don't like the word "confession".
731
01:01:35,130 --> 01:01:39,130
, 01:01:39:13 , I just want to set you straight about something you couldn't see because it was smack up against your nose.
732
01:01:39,130 --> 01:01:41,130
, 01:01:41:13 , It all began last May.
733
01:01:41,130 --> 01:01:43,000
, 01:01:43:00 , Around the end of May it was.
734
01:01:43,000 --> 01:01:46,000
, 01:01:46:00 , I remembered this auto renewal near Los Feliz Boulevard.
735
01:01:46,000 --> 01:01:48,000
, 01:01:48:00 , So I drove over there.
736
01:01:48,000 --> 01:01:53,130
, 01:01:52:00 , It was one of those California Spanish houses everyone was nuts about ten or fifteen years ago.
737
01:01:53,130 --> 01:01:57,000
, 01:01:56:00 , This one must of cost somebody about 30,000 bucks,
738
01:01:57,000 --> 01:02:00,130
, 01:01:59:13 , that is, if he ever finished paying for it."
739
01:02:00,130 --> 01:02:02,130
, 01:02:02:13 , "I'm Walter Neff, Pacific All-Risk."
740
01:02:02,130 --> 01:02:04,000
, 01:02:04:00 , Like Chandler and Wilder,
741
01:02:04,000 --> 01:02:07,000
, 01:02:06:00 , Walter Neff is a smart aleck and a snob.
742
01:02:07,000 --> 01:02:09,000
, 01:02:09:00 , "Is there anything I can do?"
743
01:02:09,000 --> 01:02:10,130
, 01:02:10:13 , "The insurance ran out on the fifteenth."
744
01:02:10,130 --> 01:02:14,130
, 01:02:13:13 , I'd hate to think of your having a smashed fender or something while you're not...
745
01:02:14,130 --> 01:02:17,000
, 01:02:16:13 , ... fully covered."
746
01:02:17,000 --> 01:02:19,130
, 01:02:19:00 , "Perhaps I know what you mean, Mr. Neff. ...
747
01:02:19,130 --> 01:02:21,000
, 01:02:21:00 , ...I was just taking a sun bath."
748
01:02:21,000 --> 01:02:23,000
, 01:02:23:00 , "No pigeons around, I hope."
749
01:02:23,000 --> 01:02:24,130
, 01:02:24:13 , And a bit of an asshole,
750
01:02:24,130 --> 01:02:27,130
, 01:02:26:13 , although less of one than the man he murders.
751
01:02:27,130 --> 01:02:30,000
, 01:02:30:00 , "Next thing you'll tell me I need earthquake insurance,
752
01:02:30,000 --> 01:02:32,000
, 01:02:32:00 , ...and lightning insurance, and hail insurance..."
753
01:02:32,000 --> 01:02:36,130
, 01:02:36:13 , "If we bought all the insurance they could think up, we'd stay broke paying for it, wouldn't we, honey?"
754
01:02:36,130 --> 01:02:40,000
, 01:02:40:00 , "What keeps us broke is your going out and buying five hats at a crack."
755
01:02:40,000 --> 01:02:44,130
, 01:02:42:13 , "Who needs a hat in California?"
756
01:02:44,130 --> 01:02:55,130
, 01:02:47:00 , And less of a monster than his partner in crime.
757
01:02:55,130 --> 01:02:57,000
, 01:02:56:13 , "Ok. This has got to be fast. ...
758
01:02:57,000 --> 01:03:00,000
, 01:03:00:00 , ...Here, take his hat. ...|Pick up his crutches back on the tracks.
759
01:03:00,000 --> 01:03:04,000
, 01:03:04:00 , The murder that inspired Cain's novel had occurred fifteen years earlier
760
01:03:04,000 --> 01:03:07,130
, 01:03:06:00 , in Queen's Village, New York,
761
01:03:07,130 --> 01:03:16,000
, 01:03:13:13 , but the crime seemed to fit the rootlessness and moral corruption of the southern California middle class.
762
01:03:16,000 --> 01:03:20,000
, 01:03:20:00 , Double Indemnity and the Cain adaptations that followed it
763
01:03:20,000 --> 01:03:25,100
, 01:03:25:00 , convinced everyone that Los Angeles is the world capital of adultery and murder.
764
01:03:25,100 --> 01:03:28,000
, 01:03:27:13 , "Okay, baby,that's it."
765
01:03:28,000 --> 01:03:35,000
, 01:03:30:13 , "What's the matter, aren't you going to kiss me?"
766
01:03:35,000 --> 01:03:42,000
, 01:03:37:13 , "It's straight down the line, isn't it?"
767
01:03:42,000 --> 01:03:44,130
, 01:03:44:00 , "I love you, Walter."
768
01:03:44,130 --> 01:03:50,130
, 01:03:47:00 , "I love you, baby."
769
01:03:50,130 --> 01:03:57,000
, 01:03:53:00 , Nowhere else is evil so banal.
770
01:03:57,000 --> 01:04:01,000
, 01:04:01:00 , Double Indemnity evokes Los Angeles without much location shooting,
771
01:04:01,000 --> 01:04:04,130
, 01:04:03:00 , but each location is memorable:
772
01:04:04,130 --> 01:04:10,000
, 01:04:06:13 , the Glendale train station at night,
773
01:04:10,000 --> 01:04:14,130
, 01:04:13:00 , a street corner identified as Vermont and Franklin
774
01:04:14,130 --> 01:04:18,130
, 01:04:17:00 , (although actually it's Hollywood and Western),
775
01:04:18,130 --> 01:04:30,130
, 01:04:21:13 , the exterior of Jerry's Market on Melrose,
776
01:04:30,130 --> 01:04:36,000
, 01:04:36:00 , and the Spanish Colonial Revival house that plays the residence of Phyllis Dietrichson,
777
01:04:36,000 --> 01:04:39,030
, 01:04:39:00 , her husband, and her step-daughter.
778
01:04:39,030 --> 01:04:43,130
, 01:04:43:00 , Neff's voice-over places this house in the hills of Los Feliz,
779
01:04:43,130 --> 01:04:47,130
, 01:04:46:00 , and that location seems right,
780
01:04:47,130 --> 01:04:50,130
, 01:04:50:13 , although the actual house is a few miles to the west,
781
01:04:50,130 --> 01:04:53,130
, 01:04:53:00 , just above the north end of Vine Street,
782
01:04:53,130 --> 01:04:58,000
, 01:04:56:00 , close to Hollywoodland where Cain had placed it.
783
01:04:58,000 --> 01:05:03,130
, 01:05:03:00 , They must have searched for a house that matched this description as closely as possible:
784
01:05:03,130 --> 01:05:06,130
, 01:05:05:13 , It was built cock-eyed.
785
01:05:06,130 --> 01:05:11,130
, 01:05:09:00 , The garage was under the house,
786
01:05:11,130 --> 01:05:15,000
, 01:05:13:13 , the first floor was over that,
787
01:05:15,000 --> 01:05:24,000
, 01:05:20:00 , and the rest of it was spilled up the hill anyway they could get it in.
788
01:05:24,000 --> 01:05:29,000
, 01:05:28:00 , Although all the interiors were filmed on studio sets,
789
01:05:29,000 --> 01:05:32,000
, 01:05:31:00 , Wilder stuck close to reality here,
790
01:05:32,000 --> 01:05:38,000
, 01:05:36:00 , taking his inspiration from the dramatic entry hall staircase.
791
01:05:38,000 --> 01:05:48,000
, 01:05:42:00 , He simply moved the living room from the left side of the entry hall to the right side.
792
01:05:48,000 --> 01:05:51,000
, 01:05:51:00 , For Wilder, a consistent modernist,
793
01:05:51,000 --> 01:05:55,000
, 01:05:55:00 , the phony historicism of the architecture and interior decor
794
01:05:55,000 --> 01:06:02,000
, 01:05:59:00 , reflects the dishonesty of the lives contained within.
795
01:06:02,000 --> 01:06:04,130
, 01:06:04:13 , But tastes have changed.
796
01:06:04,130 --> 01:06:09,000
, 01:06:09:00 , Now we all love those red-tile roofs and that wrought iron grillwork
797
01:06:09,000 --> 01:06:14,000
, 01:06:11:00 , and would do anything to preserve them.
798
01:06:14,000 --> 01:06:18,130
, 01:06:18:00 , So just as modernist architecture connotes epicene villainy,
799
01:06:18,130 --> 01:06:29,000
, 01:06:23:00 , the Spanish Colonial Revival suggests petty bourgeois good taste.
800
01:06:29,000 --> 01:06:42,130
, 01:06:33:00 , It's the ideal home for a good-bad call girl ripe for reform
801
01:06:42,130 --> 01:06:49,000
, 01:06:45:00 , or a vigilante hero out for revenge
802
01:06:49,000 --> 01:06:53,000
, 01:06:53:00 , Genteel respectability is the message in Mildred Pierce,
803
01:06:53,000 --> 01:06:56,000
, 01:06:56:00 , Hollywood's second version of a James M. Cain novel,
804
01:06:56,000 --> 01:07:02,000
, 01:06:59:00 , in which the suburbs of Los Angeles have a bit part.
805
01:07:02,000 --> 01:07:05,000
, 01:07:05:00 , "We lived on Corvallis Street, where all the houses looked alike.
806
01:07:05,000 --> 01:07:08,130
, 01:07:07:00 , Ours was number eleven-forty-three.
807
01:07:08,130 --> 01:07:10,130
, 01:07:10:00 , It's an odd observation
808
01:07:10,130 --> 01:07:13,130
, 01:07:13:00 , since the houses we see don't all look alike,
809
01:07:13,130 --> 01:07:17,000
, 01:07:16:00 , but a typical criticism of Los Angeles.
810
01:07:17,000 --> 01:07:19,000
, 01:07:19:00 , If you don't like one thing,
811
01:07:19,000 --> 01:07:22,130
, 01:07:21:13 , complain about its opposite as well.
812
01:07:22,130 --> 01:07:24,130
, 01:07:24:13 , The architecture is too eclectic,
813
01:07:24,130 --> 01:07:33,000
, 01:07:26:13 , but it's also too uniform.
814
01:07:33,000 --> 01:07:52,000
, 01:07:36:00 , Once again, the drama ends in murder.
815
01:07:52,000 --> 01:07:55,000
, 01:07:55:00 , And so it will in The Postman Always Rings Twice,
816
01:07:55,000 --> 01:08:00,000
, 01:07:58:00 , the last novel in Cain's southern California trilogy.
817
01:08:00,000 --> 01:08:02,000
, 01:08:02:00 , Hollywood filmed it twice,
818
01:08:02,000 --> 01:08:13,000
, 01:08:05:00 , in 1946 and again in 1981.
819
01:08:13,000 --> 01:08:15,110
, 01:08:15:13 , Cain's novels were written in the thirties,
820
01:08:15,110 --> 01:08:18,000
, 01:08:18:00 , and they reflect the fears of a lower middle class
821
01:08:18,000 --> 01:08:21,130
, 01:08:20:13 , hit especially hard by the Depression.
822
01:08:21,130 --> 01:08:24,130
, 01:08:24:00 , Explicitly or implicitly,
823
01:08:24,130 --> 01:08:30,130
, 01:08:28:00 , the mid-forties movie adaptations are period films.
824
01:08:30,130 --> 01:08:34,130
, 01:08:33:13 , The contemporary postwar world looked brighter.
825
01:08:34,130 --> 01:08:37,130
, 01:08:37:13 , "Daddy says, southern California is the coming part of the country. ...
826
01:08:37,130 --> 01:08:41,000
, 01:08:41:00 , ...Dad dy says, six out of every ten veterans will settle here after the war. ...
827
01:08:41,000 --> 01:08:42,000
, 01:08:42:00 , ... Daddy says..."
828
01:08:42,000 --> 01:08:46,000
, 01:08:45:00 , "Never mind about your daddy. Don't you have any ideas of your own?"
829
01:08:46,000 --> 01:08:53,130
, 01:08:49:00 , "Well, for a returning Marine, I've got some super ideas."
830
01:08:53,130 --> 01:08:58,130
, 01:08:57:00 , A new suburbia was created for the vets back from the war.
831
01:08:58,130 --> 01:09:04,130
, 01:09:02:13 , They could look forward to a good job in the booming aircraft industry,
832
01:09:04,130 --> 01:09:10,000
, 01:09:06:13 , a detached house for every family,
833
01:09:10,000 --> 01:09:14,000
, 01:09:12:13 , a trash incinerator in every backyard,
834
01:09:14,000 --> 01:09:17,000
, 01:09:16:13 , and plenty of bathrooms without toilets
835
01:09:17,000 --> 01:09:28,000
, 01:09:19:00 , at least for movie characters.
836
01:09:28,000 --> 01:09:31,130
, 01:09:31:00 , In movies, there were many harbingers of a baby boom,
837
01:09:31,130 --> 01:09:36,000
, 01:09:35:13 , yet these excessively cute kids would become, in just a few years,
838
01:09:36,000 --> 01:09:40,130
, 01:09:40:00 , the excessively troubled teenagers of Rebel Without a Cause,
839
01:09:40,130 --> 01:09:43,000
, 01:09:42:00 , the first teen noir.
840
01:09:43,000 --> 01:09:45,000
, 01:09:45:00 , "That's a fine way to behave."
841
01:09:45,000 --> 01:09:47,000
, 01:09:47:00 , "Well, you know who he takes after."
842
01:09:47,000 --> 01:09:51,000
, 01:09:49:00 , "You're tearing me apart!"
843
01:09:51,000 --> 01:09:55,130
, 01:09:55:13 , Director Nicholas Ray photographed real locations around Los Angeles
844
01:09:55,130 --> 01:10:01,000
, 01:09:58:13 , to look like sets in a studio musical.
845
01:10:01,000 --> 01:10:03,130
, 01:10:03:13 , Musicals establish alternate worlds,
846
01:10:03,130 --> 01:10:09,130
, 01:10:06:13 , and that is precisely Ray's achievement.
847
01:10:09,130 --> 01:10:15,130
, 01:10:15:00 , The teenagers live in a world that is parallel to the adult world of normality and stability,
848
01:10:15,130 --> 01:10:17,130
, 01:10:17:13 , in a world they have created for themselves
849
01:10:17,130 --> 01:10:24,130
, 01:10:20:00 , and that is almost a parody of film noir.
850
01:10:24,130 --> 01:10:28,130
, 01:10:27:13 , Their world is more dangerous than that of their parents
851
01:10:28,130 --> 01:10:31,000
, 01:10:30:13 , and more attractive.
852
01:10:31,000 --> 01:10:36,000
, 01:10:33:00 , "Hit your lights!"
853
01:10:36,000 --> 01:10:39,130
, 01:10:38:00 , It is also privileged in the film.
854
01:10:39,130 --> 01:10:42,130
, 01:10:42:00 , We see the adult world through their eyes.
855
01:10:42,130 --> 01:10:48,130
, 01:10:45:00 , But we have no other perspective on theirs.
856
01:10:48,130 --> 01:10:51,130
, 01:10:51:13 , The teenagers are able to create their own separate world
857
01:10:51,130 --> 01:10:58,130
, 01:10:54:13 , only because of their easy access to automobiles.
858
01:10:58,130 --> 01:11:01,000
, 01:11:01:00 , They were the first teenagers with cars,
859
01:11:01,000 --> 01:11:04,130
, 01:11:03:00 , at least in the movies,
860
01:11:04,130 --> 01:11:08,000
, 01:11:08:00 , and maybe that's why Rebel Without a Cause seems so prophetic
861
01:11:08,000 --> 01:11:18,130
, 01:11:10:13 , and so evocative of Los Angeles.
862
01:11:18,130 --> 01:11:32,000
, 01:11:22:13 , More conventional noir films only fitfully revealed the look of the city.
863
01:11:32,000 --> 01:11:35,130
, 01:11:35:00 , Those streets dark with something more than night
864
01:11:35,130 --> 01:11:41,000
, 01:11:39:00 , were still more often than not located on studio back lots.
865
01:11:41,000 --> 01:12:12,130
, 01:11:46:00 , Film noir generally shunned the mean streets for the meaner sewers.
866
01:12:12,130 --> 01:12:15,130
, 01:12:15:00 , The real streets appear in Kiss Me Deadly,
867
01:12:15,130 --> 01:12:17,130
, 01:12:17:13 , although this urban road movie
868
01:12:17,130 --> 01:12:25,130
, 01:12:20:13 , didn't announce itself as a portrait of Los Angeles.
869
01:12:25,130 --> 01:12:27,130
, 01:12:27:13 , It's a private eye movie,
870
01:12:27,130 --> 01:12:30,000
, 01:12:30:00 , a revisionist version of Mickey Spillane
871
01:12:30,000 --> 01:12:33,130
, 01:12:33:13 , that tries to reverse his hyperfascist version of McCarthyism
872
01:12:33,130 --> 01:12:41,130
, 01:12:36:13 , by giving Mike Hammer enough rope to hang himself.
873
01:12:41,130 --> 01:12:46,130
, 01:12:43:13 , "My dear sir."
874
01:12:46,130 --> 01:12:48,130
, 01:12:48:13 , "Now tell me about the key."
875
01:12:48,130 --> 01:12:54,000
, 01:12:50:13 , "Just a minute, sir."
876
01:12:54,000 --> 01:13:00,000
, 01:12:58:00 , It's close to definitive as a portrait of the city in the mid-fifties.
877
01:13:00,000 --> 01:13:03,130
, 01:13:02:13 , Kiss Me Deadly is a literalist film.
878
01:13:03,130 --> 01:13:06,000
, 01:13:06:00 , Mike Hammer has a real address:
879
01:13:06,000 --> 01:13:10,000
, 01:13:08:13 , 10401 Wilshire Boulevard.
880
01:13:10,000 --> 01:13:14,130
, 01:13:14:00 , And when he pulls away from his apartment building in his new Corvette,
881
01:13:14,130 --> 01:13:21,130
, 01:13:17:13 , what we see is what was really there.
882
01:13:21,130 --> 01:13:25,130
, 01:13:25:00 , "My mustache, my father's mustache. ...
883
01:13:25,130 --> 01:13:26,180
, 01:13:26:18 , ... Let's go to the freeway. ...
884
01:13:26,180 --> 01:13:30,000
, 01:13:29:00 , I want to see how this little bird flies."
885
01:13:30,000 --> 01:13:32,000
, 01:13:32:00 , Mike Hammer's journeys,
886
01:13:32,000 --> 01:13:33,180
, 01:13:33:18 , all shot on location,
887
01:13:33,180 --> 01:13:37,130
, 01:13:35:18 , reveal a city divided.
888
01:13:37,130 --> 01:13:38,130
, 01:13:38:13 , The rich...
889
01:13:38,130 --> 01:13:44,130
, 01:13:40:00 , and the poor.
890
01:13:44,130 --> 01:13:45,130
, 01:13:45:13 , The old...
891
01:13:45,130 --> 01:13:47,130
, 01:13:47:00 , and the new.
892
01:13:47,130 --> 01:13:59,000
, 01:13:50:00 , What was new then is still with us.
893
01:13:59,000 --> 01:14:03,000
, 01:14:03:00 , "This is Crestview five-four-one-two-four...
894
01:14:03,000 --> 01:14:07,000
, 01:14:07:00 , Mr. Hammer, whom you are calling, is not available at present. ...
895
01:14:07,000 --> 01:14:09,000
, 01:14:09:00 , If you wish to leave a record of your call,
896
01:14:09,000 --> 01:14:13,130
, 01:14:12:00 , ... please state your message at the sound of the tone."
897
01:14:13,130 --> 01:14:16,050
, 01:14:16:05 , "Hello, Mike, just checking to see if you got home...
898
01:14:16,050 --> 01:14:18,050
, 01:14:18:05 , Please call me when you..."
899
01:14:18,050 --> 01:14:22,000
, 01:14:19:05 , "Velda."
900
01:14:22,000 --> 01:14:25,130
, 01:14:24:00 , What was old has been destroyed.
901
01:14:25,130 --> 01:14:27,130
, 01:14:27:13 , Images of things that aren't there any more
902
01:14:27,130 --> 01:14:31,000
, 01:14:30:00 , mean a lot to those of us who live in Los Angeles,
903
01:14:31,000 --> 01:14:34,130
, 01:14:33:14 , and practically nothing to everyone else,
904
01:14:34,130 --> 01:14:40,130
, 01:14:39:13 , except perhaps when they represent things that have disappeared from urban centers everywhere,
905
01:14:40,130 --> 01:14:45,000
, 01:14:42:13 , like drive-in restaurants
906
01:14:45,000 --> 01:15:35,000
, 01:14:47:00 , or drive-in movies.
907
01:15:35,000 --> 01:15:43,000
, 01:15:39:00 , Of course, there are certain types of buildings that aren't designed to last.
908
01:15:43,000 --> 01:15:45,130
, 01:15:45:13 , They must be rebuilt every five or ten years
909
01:15:45,130 --> 01:15:54,130
, 01:15:48:13 , so they can adapt to changing patterns of consumption.
910
01:15:54,130 --> 01:15:57,000
, 01:15:57:00 , So the image of an obsolete gas station
911
01:15:57,000 --> 01:15:58,130
, 01:15:58:05 , or grocery store
912
01:15:58,130 --> 01:16:05,000
, 01:16:03:13 , can evoke the same kind of nostalgia we feel for any commodity whose day has passed.
913
01:16:05,000 --> 01:16:08,000
, 01:16:08:00 , Old movies allow us to rediscover these icons,
914
01:16:08,000 --> 01:16:12,130
, 01:16:11:13 , even to construct a documenary history of their evolution.
915
01:16:12,130 --> 01:16:14,000
, 01:16:14:00 , "Tell this character we want to go..."
916
01:16:14,000 --> 01:16:15,130
, 01:16:15:13 , "Can I help you, sir?"
917
01:16:15,130 --> 01:16:17,130
, 01:16:17:13 , "Oh, yeah. Give me five gallons of regular."
918
01:16:17,130 --> 01:16:18,130
, 01:16:18:13 , "Regular."
919
01:16:18,130 --> 01:16:20,130
, 01:16:20:13 , "I thought you said we were going to dancing.."
920
01:16:20,130 --> 01:16:24,000
, 01:16:23:00 , "Come here, homes. Come here, I wnt to talk to you."
921
01:16:24,000 --> 01:16:26,000
, 01:16:26:00 , "Wo Puld you check under the hood, too, please?"
922
01:16:26,000 --> 01:16:43,000
, 01:16:27:00 , "Sure."
923
01:16:43,000 --> 01:16:46,130
, 01:16:46:00 , "Hello, there. Fill'er up?"
924
01:16:46,130 --> 01:16:50,130
, 01:16:49:00 , "Two dollars, no knock!"
925
01:16:50,130 --> 01:19:28,130
, 01:16:52:00 , "Yes, sir."
926
01:19:28,130 --> 01:19:33,130
, 01:19:33:00 , "There goes Williams. He slides. He's in there, safe."
927
01:19:33,130 --> 01:19:36,130
, 01:19:36:13 , But who cares about our old minor league baseball parks,
928
01:19:36,130 --> 01:19:40,000
, 01:19:39:00 , Wrigley Field, home of the Angels,
929
01:19:40,000 --> 01:19:43,000
, 01:19:43:00 , and Gilmore Field, home of the Hollywood Stars,
930
01:19:43,000 --> 01:19:49,130
, 01:19:47:00 , or the Twinks, as our local sportswriters liked to call them?
931
01:19:49,130 --> 01:19:57,130
, 01:19:54:00 , "Cushions a dime. Ten cents only. Be comfortable for a dime. Get your cushions here."
932
01:19:57,130 --> 01:20:29,000
, 01:20:02:00 , Who remembers Steve Bilko and Bobby Bragan and Carlos Bernier?
933
01:20:29,000 --> 01:20:34,000
, 01:20:33:13 , The crowd scenes in The Atomic City feature real baseball fans,
934
01:20:34,000 --> 01:20:35,130
, 01:20:35:13 , not professional extras,
935
01:20:35,130 --> 01:20:37,050
, 01:20:37:05 , who were then still cast
936
01:20:37,050 --> 01:20:41,000
, 01:20:41:00 , according to the requirements of a production code that prohibited
937
01:20:41,000 --> 01:20:49,000
, 01:20:45:00 , any scenes showing the social intermingling of white and colored people.
938
01:20:49,000 --> 01:20:54,130
, 01:20:54:00 , They suggest that Los Angeles may have been more comfortably integrated in 1952
939
01:20:54,130 --> 01:20:59,000
, 01:20:56:13 , than it is today.
940
01:20:59,000 --> 01:21:02,000
, 01:21:01:13 , And who mourns the Pan Pacific Auditorium,
941
01:21:02,000 --> 01:21:05,000
, 01:21:05:00 , our Streamline Moderne palace,
942
01:21:05,000 --> 01:21:08,000
, 01:21:07:00 , once the city's most famous landmark,
943
01:21:08,000 --> 01:21:11,130
, 01:21:11:00 , where the college basketball teams played their games,
944
01:21:11,130 --> 01:21:17,000
, 01:21:15:00 , where Robert Frank photographed the Motorama in 1956.
945
01:21:17,000 --> 01:21:22,130
, 01:21:19:13 , It played a dog racing track in Johnny Eager
946
01:21:22,130 --> 01:21:27,130
, 01:21:25:13 , and an arena for ice skating shows in Suspense.
947
01:21:27,130 --> 01:21:31,000
, 01:21:31:00 , In 1980, after the Pan Pacific had been abandoned,
948
01:21:31,000 --> 01:21:34,000
, 01:21:34:00 , Lawrence Gordon produced an ill-fated fantasy
949
01:21:34,000 --> 01:21:39,130
, 01:21:37:13 , of what the preservationists call adaptive reuse.
950
01:21:39,130 --> 01:21:44,000
, 01:21:43:13 , A muse inspires a young artist to convince an aging clarinetist
951
01:21:44,000 --> 01:21:50,000
, 01:21:48:00 , that it is the ideal locale for the nightclub he wants to open.
952
01:21:50,000 --> 01:21:52,130
, 01:21:52:13 , "You really think this could work out for Danny?"
953
01:21:52,130 --> 01:21:56,000
, 01:21:56:00 , "I think this place could be anything you want it to be."
954
01:21:56,000 --> 01:22:02,130
, 01:21:58:13 , "Yeah, but what the hell to call it?"
955
01:22:02,130 --> 01:22:07,000
, 01:22:06:13 , "In Xanadu did Kublah Khan a stately pleasure dome decree."
956
01:22:07,000 --> 01:22:12,000
, 01:22:09:15 , Alas, their dream turns out to be...
957
01:22:12,000 --> 01:22:15,130
, 01:22:14:00 , a roller disco.
958
01:22:15,130 --> 01:22:17,000
, 01:22:17:00 , The film failed,
959
01:22:17,000 --> 01:22:22,000
, 01:22:21:00 , and what was left of the Pan Pacific burned down nine years later.
960
01:22:22,000 --> 01:22:24,000
, 01:22:24:00 , It deserved better,
961
01:22:24,000 --> 01:22:29,000
, 01:22:26:13 , both in the movies and in reality.
962
01:22:29,000 --> 01:22:35,000
, 01:22:33:00 , "A place where nobody dared to go ...
963
01:22:35,000 --> 01:22:38,000
, 01:22:38:00 , ...A love that we came to know ...
964
01:22:38,000 --> 01:22:45,000
, 01:22:41:00 , ... They call it Xanadu."
965
01:22:45,000 --> 01:22:47,000
, 01:22:47:00 , So did the Richfield Building,
966
01:22:47,000 --> 01:22:49,000
, 01:22:49:00 , which had to make way for taller,
967
01:22:49,000 --> 01:22:52,000
, 01:22:51:00 , uglier skyscrapers.
968
01:22:52,000 --> 01:22:54,000
, 01:22:54:00 , There are many photographs,
969
01:22:54,000 --> 01:22:57,000
, 01:22:56:00 , but only a few movie shots.
970
01:22:57,000 --> 01:23:02,130
, 01:22:59:00 , Thanks to Antonioni.
971
01:23:02,130 --> 01:23:05,000
, 01:23:05:00 , What about Ship's Westwood,
972
01:23:05,000 --> 01:23:09,000
, 01:23:07:00 , a coffee shop that was open all night?
973
01:23:09,000 --> 01:23:11,000
, 01:23:11:00 , It was an institution,
974
01:23:11,000 --> 01:23:27,130
, 01:23:16:00 , but it didn't stand a chance when someone realized you could put a skyscraper in the same space.
975
01:23:27,130 --> 01:23:29,130
, 01:23:29:13 , "Thanks, Amy."
976
01:23:29,130 --> 01:23:33,130
, 01:23:32:00 , At least the Far East Café is still there.
977
01:23:33,130 --> 01:23:37,000
, 01:23:36:13 , It closed down after the 1994 earthquake,
978
01:23:37,000 --> 01:23:42,000
, 01:23:39:13 , but it is supposed to reopen soon.
979
01:23:42,000 --> 01:23:44,000
, 01:23:44:00 , And so is the Angel's Flight.
980
01:23:44,000 --> 01:23:46,000
, 01:23:46:00 , Our beloved funicular,
981
01:23:46,000 --> 01:23:49,000
, 01:23:48:00 , "the shortest railway in the world"
982
01:23:49,000 --> 01:23:51,130
, 01:23:51:00 , built in 1901,
983
01:23:51,130 --> 01:23:56,130
, 01:23:55:13 , ripped up in 1969 by the Community Redevelopment Agency,
984
01:23:56,130 --> 01:23:59,000
, 01:23:58:13 , reconstructed in 1996,
985
01:23:59,000 --> 01:24:03,000
, 01:24:01:00 , a block south of its original location,
986
01:24:03,000 --> 01:24:06,130
, 01:24:06:00 , closed after a crash in February 2001,
987
01:24:06,130 --> 01:24:10,000
, 01:24:08:13 , just a few days after I filmed it.
988
01:24:10,000 --> 01:24:11,130
, 01:24:11:13 , But it's still there...
989
01:24:11,130 --> 01:24:14,000
, 01:24:13:00 , sort of.
990
01:24:14,000 --> 01:24:17,130
, 01:24:17:00 , The reconstructed Angel's Flight was a tourist ride,
991
01:24:17,130 --> 01:24:19,130
, 01:24:19:00 , a simulation,
992
01:24:19,130 --> 01:24:24,000
, 01:24:21:13 , because it had lost its original purpose.
993
01:24:24,000 --> 01:24:25,130
, 01:24:25:00 , Bunker Hill,
994
01:24:25,130 --> 01:24:29,000
, 01:24:28:13 , the residential neighborhood at the top of the Angel's Flight,
995
01:24:29,000 --> 01:24:38,000
, 01:24:31:00 , had vanished.
996
01:24:38,000 --> 01:24:41,130
, 01:24:40:00 , The movies loved Bunker Hill.
997
01:24:41,130 --> 01:24:44,130
, 01:24:43:13 , The lords of the city hated it.
998
01:24:44,130 --> 01:24:52,000
, 01:24:49:13 , Rents were low, so it put the wrong kind of people too close to downtown.
999
01:24:52,000 --> 01:25:01,000
, 01:24:56:00 , Bunker Hill became a target for slum clearance or urban renewal.
1000
01:25:01,000 --> 01:25:07,130
, 01:25:03:13 , They had to destroy it in order to save it.
1001
01:25:07,130 --> 01:25:09,130
, 01:25:09:13 , And destroy it they did,
1002
01:25:09,130 --> 01:25:14,130
, 01:25:12:00 , although it took more than ten years.
1003
01:25:14,130 --> 01:25:19,000
, 01:25:18:00 , Bunker Hill was the most photographed district in Los Angeles,
1004
01:25:19,000 --> 01:25:25,000
, 01:25:24:00 , so the movies unwittingly documented its destruction and depopulation.
1005
01:25:25,000 --> 01:25:27,000
, 01:25:27:00 , In the late forties,
1006
01:25:27,000 --> 01:25:37,130
, 01:25:30:00 , it could represent a solid working-class neighborhood,
1007
01:25:37,130 --> 01:25:44,000
, 01:25:41:13 , a place where a guy could take his girl home to meet his mother.
1008
01:25:44,000 --> 01:25:45,130
, 01:25:45:13 , "Ah, buena sera, mamma mia."
1009
01:25:45,130 --> 01:25:53,000
, 01:25:47:00 , "Buena sera."
1010
01:25:53,000 --> 01:25:56,000
, 01:25:55:14 , It was film noir territory,
1011
01:25:56,000 --> 01:26:02,000
, 01:25:59:00 , but it was a refuge from the meaner streets of the city.
1012
01:26:02,000 --> 01:26:03,130
, 01:26:03:13 , By the mid-fifties,
1013
01:26:03,130 --> 01:26:06,000
, 01:26:06:00 , it had become a neighborhood of rooming houses
1014
01:26:06,000 --> 01:26:14,000
, 01:26:09:00 , where a man who knows too much might hole up or hide out.
1015
01:26:14,000 --> 01:26:18,000
, 01:26:18:00 , Hollywood had come to accept Raymond Chandler's vision of Bunker Hill
1016
01:26:18,000 --> 01:26:22,050
, 01:26:22:00 , As old town, wop town, crook town, arty town...
1017
01:26:22,050 --> 01:26:24,000
, 01:26:24:00 , where you could find anything
1018
01:26:24,000 --> 01:26:28,000
, 01:26:28:00 , from crooks on the lam to ladies of anybody's evening
1019
01:26:28,000 --> 01:26:31,000
, 01:26:31:00 , to County Relief clients brawling with haggard landladies
1020
01:26:31,000 --> 01:26:34,130
, 01:26:34:00 , in grand old houses with scrolled porches...
1021
01:26:34,130 --> 01:26:37,000
, 01:26:37:00 , "A guy could get a heart attack walking up here."
1022
01:26:37,000 --> 01:26:39,130
, 01:26:39:00 , "Who invited you?"
1023
01:26:39,130 --> 01:26:41,000
, 01:26:41:00 , "Carmen Trivago, what room?"
1024
01:26:41,000 --> 01:26:42,130
, 01:26:42:00 , "Follow your ear."
1025
01:26:42,130 --> 01:26:46,000
, 01:26:45:00 , The best Bunker Hill movie is The Exiles,
1026
01:26:46,000 --> 01:26:50,000
, 01:26:49:00 , an independent low-budget film by Kent MacKenzie,
1027
01:26:50,000 --> 01:26:54,130
, 01:26:53:00 , about Indians from Arizona exiled in Los Angeles,
1028
01:26:54,130 --> 01:26:56,130
, 01:26:56:00 , shot in 1958,
1029
01:26:56,130 --> 01:27:03,000
, 01:26:58:00 , completed in 1961.
1030
01:27:03,000 --> 01:27:07,000
, 01:27:06:13 , It reveals the city as a place where reality is opaque,
1031
01:27:07,000 --> 01:27:09,000
, 01:27:09:00 , where different social orders
1032
01:27:09,000 --> 01:27:11,000
, 01:27:11:00 , coexist in the same space
1033
01:27:11,000 --> 01:27:37,000
, 01:27:13:00 , without touching each other.
1034
01:27:37,000 --> 01:27:39,000
, 01:27:39:00 , Better than any other movie,
1035
01:27:39,000 --> 01:27:42,050
, 01:27:42:00 , it proves that there once was a city here,
1036
01:27:42,050 --> 01:27:52,080
, 01:27:46:00 , before they tore it down and built a simulacrum.
1037
01:27:52,080 --> 01:27:56,000
, 01:27:55:13 , The end of Bunker Hill is visible in The Omega Man.
1038
01:27:56,000 --> 01:27:58,000
, 01:27:57:13 , By 1971
1039
01:27:58,000 --> 01:28:02,000
, 01:28:01:13 , it made a good location for a post-apocalyptic fantasy.
1040
01:28:02,000 --> 01:28:06,000
, 01:28:06:00 , Charlton Heston plays an urban survivalist in a cityscape
1041
01:28:06,000 --> 01:28:12,000
, 01:28:08:00 , depopulated by biological warfare.
1042
01:28:12,000 --> 01:28:17,000
, 01:28:14:13 , He has learned to become totally self-reliant.
1043
01:28:17,000 --> 01:28:19,130
, 01:28:19:13 , If he wants to see a movie,
1044
01:28:19,130 --> 01:28:24,000
, 01:28:21:13 , he has to project it himself.
1045
01:28:24,000 --> 01:28:26,000
, 01:28:25:13 , "This is really beautiful , man....
1046
01:28:26,000 --> 01:28:29,000
, 01:28:28:13 , ... If we can't all live together and be happy? ...
1047
01:28:29,000 --> 01:28:31,000
, 01:28:31:00 , ... If you have to be afraid to walk out in the street,
1048
01:28:31,000 --> 01:28:35,000
, 01:28:34:13 , if you have to be afraid to smile at somebody, right?
1049
01:28:35,000 --> 01:28:39,000
, 01:28:38:00 , What kind of a way is that to go through this life?"
1050
01:28:39,000 --> 01:28:41,130
, 01:28:41:13 , All his movie shows are matinees,
1051
01:28:41,130 --> 01:28:47,000
, 01:28:46:00 , because at night he must fight off a gang of Luddite hippie vampires,
1052
01:28:47,000 --> 01:29:01,000
, 01:28:49:00 , his only companions in the city.
1053
01:29:01,000 --> 01:29:02,130
, 01:29:02:13 , Thirteen years later,
1054
01:29:02,130 --> 01:29:05,000
, 01:29:05:00 , the same plot and the same location
1055
01:29:05,000 --> 01:29:08,130
, 01:29:07:13 , reappear in Night of the Comet.
1056
01:29:08,130 --> 01:29:10,130
, 01:29:10:13 , In the wake of a disaster
1057
01:29:10,130 --> 01:29:12,130
, 01:29:12:13 , apparently brought on by comet dust,
1058
01:29:12,130 --> 01:29:15,000
, 01:29:15:00 , a small band of human survivors
1059
01:29:15,000 --> 01:29:27,130
, 01:29:17:00 , again battle zombie-like mutants,
1060
01:29:27,130 --> 01:29:29,130
, 01:29:29:13 , but the center of the action,
1061
01:29:29,130 --> 01:29:31,000
, 01:29:31:00 , Bunker Hill,
1062
01:29:31,000 --> 01:29:38,000
, 01:29:33:00 , has been totally transformed.
1063
01:29:38,000 --> 01:29:41,000
, 01:29:41:00 , The new Bunker Hill looks like a simulated city,
1064
01:29:41,000 --> 01:29:58,130
, 01:29:43:00 , and it played one in Virtuosity.
1065
01:29:58,130 --> 01:30:03,000
, 01:30:03:00 , But the directors who did the most to make Los Angeles a character in movies
1066
01:30:03,000 --> 01:30:04,000
, 01:30:04:00 , and then a subject
1067
01:30:04,000 --> 01:30:08,130
, 01:30:07:00 , were outsiders, like Wilder, or tourists.
1068
01:30:08,130 --> 01:30:13,000
, 01:30:12:00 , They weren't interested in what made Los Angeles like a city;
1069
01:30:13,000 --> 01:30:20,000
, 01:30:17:00 , they were interested in what made Los Angeles unlike the cities they knew.
1070
01:30:20,000 --> 01:30:23,000
, 01:30:22:00 , Just as there are highbrows and lowbrows,
1071
01:30:23,000 --> 01:30:26,000
, 01:30:25:00 , there are high tourists and low tourists.
1072
01:30:26,000 --> 01:30:30,130
, 01:30:30:00 , Just as there are highbrow directors and lowbrow directors,
1073
01:30:30,130 --> 01:30:35,130
, 01:30:34:00 , there are high tourist directors and low tourist directors.
1074
01:30:35,130 --> 01:30:37,000
, 01:30:37:00 , Low tourist directors
1075
01:30:37,000 --> 01:30:39,130
, 01:30:39:13 , generally disdain Los Angeles.
1076
01:30:39,130 --> 01:30:44,130
, 01:30:43:13 , They prefer San Francisco and the coastline of northern California.
1077
01:30:44,130 --> 01:30:52,130
, 01:30:46:13 , More picturesque.
1078
01:30:52,130 --> 01:30:55,000
, 01:30:55:00 , The greatest low tourist director is, of course,
1079
01:30:55,000 --> 01:30:58,000
, 01:30:57:00 , Alfred Hitchcock,
1080
01:30:58,000 --> 01:31:13,130
, 01:31:02:13 , and he set four memorable films around the San Francisco Bay Area.
1081
01:31:13,130 --> 01:31:16,130
, 01:31:16:00 , But only one of his thirty American films
1082
01:31:16,130 --> 01:31:19,130
, 01:31:19:00 , is set even partially in Los Angeles.
1083
01:31:19,130 --> 01:31:22,000
, 01:31:22:00 , The first ten minutes of Saboteur
1084
01:31:22,000 --> 01:31:25,000
, 01:31:25:00 , are located in or around Los Angeles,
1085
01:31:25,000 --> 01:31:27,000
, 01:31:27:00 , but it could be anywhere in America
1086
01:31:27,000 --> 01:31:29,130
, 01:31:29:00 , where there is an aircraft factory.
1087
01:31:29,130 --> 01:31:32,000
, 01:31:32:00 , The scenes were shot in the studio,
1088
01:31:32,000 --> 01:31:39,130
, 01:31:35:00 , and there is nothing distinctive to the region in the sets.
1089
01:31:39,130 --> 01:31:43,130
, 01:31:43:13 , Hitchcock even had Marion Crane bypass Los Angeles
1090
01:31:43,130 --> 01:31:51,000
, 01:31:48:00 , on her fateful journey from Phoenix to the Bates Motel in northern California.
1091
01:31:51,000 --> 01:31:55,000
, 01:31:55:00 , But he never had an unkind word for his adopted home town,
1092
01:31:55,000 --> 01:32:02,130
, 01:31:57:00 , at least in his movies.
1093
01:32:02,130 --> 01:32:04,000
, 01:32:04:00 , Another low tourist director,
1094
01:32:04,000 --> 01:32:05,130
, 01:32:05:13 , Woody Allen,
1095
01:32:05,130 --> 01:32:09,130
, 01:32:09:13 , plainly expressed his disdain for Los Angeles in his most popular movie
1096
01:32:09,130 --> 01:32:11,130
, 01:32:11:13 , "No, I cannot... You keep bringing it up, ...
1097
01:32:11,130 --> 01:32:13,000
, 01:32:13:00 , but I don't wanna live in a city
1098
01:32:13,000 --> 01:32:18,000
, 01:32:17:00 , where the only cultural advantage is that you can make a right turn on a red light."
1099
01:32:18,000 --> 01:32:22,130
, 01:32:22:00 , As the cinematic chronicler of New York's middle-brow middle class,
1100
01:32:22,130 --> 01:32:25,130
, 01:32:25:13 , the people who believe what they read in the New York Times,
1101
01:32:25,130 --> 01:32:30,130
, 01:32:28:13 , Allen rarely strays from his native milieu.
1102
01:32:30,130 --> 01:32:33,000
, 01:32:33:00 , But his best friend does move to Los Angeles,
1103
01:32:33,000 --> 01:32:35,000
, 01:32:34:13 , and Woody follows
1104
01:32:35,000 --> 01:32:37,130
, 01:32:37:00 , although only for a visit.
1105
01:32:37,130 --> 01:32:41,000
, 01:32:40:13 , "You know, I can't believe that this is really Beverly Hills."
1106
01:32:41,000 --> 01:32:43,000
, 01:32:43:00 , "The architecture is really consistent isn't it, ...
1107
01:32:43,000 --> 01:32:46,130
, 01:32:46:00 , ... French next to Spanish, next to Tudor, next to Japanese."
1108
01:32:46,130 --> 01:32:49,000
, 01:32:48:13 , "God, it's so clean out here."
1109
01:32:49,000 --> 01:32:51,000
, 01:32:51:00 , "It's because they don't throw their garbage away, ...
1110
01:32:51,000 --> 01:32:56,130
, 01:32:53:00 , ... they make it into television shows."
1111
01:32:56,130 --> 01:33:05,130
, 01:33:00:00 , His tale of two cities becomes a tale of two marquees.
1112
01:33:05,130 --> 01:33:09,130
, 01:33:09:00 , In fact, The Sorrow and the Pity did play in Los Angeles
1113
01:33:09,130 --> 01:33:11,130
, 01:33:11:00 , I saw it here
1114
01:33:11,130 --> 01:33:13,000
, 01:33:13:00 , and, for all I know,
1115
01:33:13,000 --> 01:33:20,130
, 01:33:17:00 , The House of Exorcism and Messiah of Evil played in New York.
1116
01:33:20,130 --> 01:33:23,130
, 01:33:23:00 , But if New York has Woody Allen to live down,
1117
01:33:23,130 --> 01:33:25,130
, 01:33:25:00 , we can't feel superior.
1118
01:33:25,130 --> 01:33:27,130
, 01:33:27:00 , We have Henry Jaglom,
1119
01:33:27,130 --> 01:33:29,130
, 01:33:29:00 , who is even balder,
1120
01:33:29,130 --> 01:33:31,000
, 01:33:31:00 , even more narcissistic,
1121
01:33:31,000 --> 01:33:32,000
, 01:33:33:00 , even more solipsistic.
1122
01:33:32,000 --> 01:33:35,000
, 01:33:35:00 , "I've learned that risks are the best thing...
1123
01:33:35,000 --> 01:33:38,000
, 01:33:38:00 , ... Everything that happens good and exciting, that happens in film and in life ...
1124
01:33:38,000 --> 01:33:40,000
, 01:33:40:00 , ...comes as a result of risk...
1125
01:33:40,000 --> 01:33:46,060
, 01:33:42:00 , Risk is my middle name."
1126
01:33:46,060 --> 01:33:49,000
, 01:33:48:06 , While New Yorkers are generally hostile,
1127
01:33:49,000 --> 01:33:51,130
, 01:33:51:13 , the British are often fascinated.
1128
01:33:51,130 --> 01:33:53,000
, 01:33:53:00 , In The Loved One,
1129
01:33:53,000 --> 01:33:53,000
, 01:33:55:13 , Tony Richardson acknowledges his ambivalence.
1130
01:33:53,000 --> 01:33:57,000
, 01:33:56:00 , Tony Richardson acknowledges his ambivalence.
1131
01:33:57,000 --> 01:33:59,130
, 01:33:59:00 , The local architecture is kitsch,
1132
01:33:59,130 --> 01:34:13,130
, 01:34:01:13 , but it is transcendent kitsch.
1133
01:34:13,130 --> 01:34:16,000
, 01:34:16:00 , A movie studio is a cruel court
1134
01:34:16,000 --> 01:34:20,130
, 01:34:20:00 , where everyone is subject to the most wayward whim of its mogul,
1135
01:34:20,130 --> 01:34:25,130
, 01:34:25:00 , but the back lot is an enchanted village of accidental surrealism.
1136
01:34:25,130 --> 01:34:28,000
, 01:34:28:00 , "The climate here suits me admirably. ...
1137
01:34:28,000 --> 01:34:30,000
, 01:34:30:00 , And the people here are so kind and generous.
1138
01:34:30,000 --> 01:34:32,000
, 01:34:32:00 , They talk entirely for their own pleasure,
1139
01:34:32,000 --> 01:34:35,130
, 01:34:34:00 , and they never expect you to listen."
1140
01:34:35,130 --> 01:34:37,130
, 01:34:37:13 , People who hate Los Angeles
1141
01:34:37,130 --> 01:35:04,000
, 01:34:39:13 , love Point Blank.
1142
01:35:04,000 --> 01:35:06,000
, 01:35:06:00 , British director John Boorman
1143
01:35:06,000 --> 01:35:10,130
, 01:35:09:00 , managed to make the city look both bland and insidious,
1144
01:35:10,130 --> 01:35:14,130
, 01:35:13:13 , like the gangster organization Lee Marvin smashes,
1145
01:35:14,130 --> 01:35:33,130
, 01:35:17:13 , which goes by the name Multiplex Products Company.
1146
01:35:33,130 --> 01:35:34,130
, 01:35:34:13 , For me
1147
01:35:34,130 --> 01:35:36,000
, 01:35:36:00 , the highlight of the film
1148
01:35:36,000 --> 01:35:41,130
, 01:35:40:00 , is the astonishing tableau of grotesque interior decoration schemes.
1149
01:35:41,130 --> 01:36:14,000
, 01:35:45:00 , It's enough to make you believe the seventies began in the mid-sixties.
1150
01:36:14,000 --> 01:36:18,000
, 01:36:17:00 , Is an LSD movie low tourist or high tourist?
1151
01:36:18,000 --> 01:36:20,130
, 01:36:20:13 , Roger Corman, the director of The Trip,
1152
01:36:20,130 --> 01:36:23,000
, 01:36:22:13 , is no tourist in Los Angeles,
1153
01:36:23,000 --> 01:36:27,130
, 01:36:27:00 , but he probably needed a guidebookto open the doors of perception.
1154
01:36:27,130 --> 01:36:31,000
, 01:36:31:00 , Luckily he had Jack Nicholson to write the script,
1155
01:36:31,000 --> 01:36:35,000
, 01:36:34:00 , Peter Fonda and Bruce Dern as traveling companions,
1156
01:36:35,000 --> 01:37:08,000
, 01:36:38:00 , and Dennis Jakob to create the montage sequences.
1157
01:37:08,000 --> 01:37:11,130
, 01:37:11:00 , Experimental high tourist film-makers like Corman,
1158
01:37:11,130 --> 01:37:12,130
, 01:37:12:13 , Maya Deren,
1159
01:37:12,130 --> 01:37:14,000
, 01:37:14:00 , Andy Warhol,
1160
01:37:14,000 --> 01:37:15,130
, 01:37:15:13 , and Fred Halsted
1161
01:37:15,130 --> 01:37:28,000
, 01:37:19:00 , discovered a pastoral arcadia near the heart of Los Angeles.
1162
01:37:28,000 --> 01:37:31,000
, 01:37:31:00 , Deren and her collaborator Alexander Hammid
1163
01:37:31,000 --> 01:37:33,000
, 01:37:33:00 , could find a private Eden
1164
01:37:33,000 --> 01:37:37,130
, 01:37:37:00 , just by gazing out the window of their Spanish Colonial Revival duplex
1165
01:37:37,130 --> 01:37:46,000
, 01:37:39:00 , above the Sunset Strip.
1166
01:37:46,000 --> 01:37:48,000
, 01:37:47:13 , For Warhol,
1167
01:37:48,000 --> 01:37:56,000
, 01:37:52:13 , Hollywood formulas represented an innocence that could be regained only "sort of"
1168
01:37:56,000 --> 01:37:59,000
, 01:37:59:00 , but Sam Rodia's towers in Watts
1169
01:37:59,000 --> 01:38:20,000
, 01:38:01:00 , were a bit of paradise not yet lost.
1170
01:38:20,000 --> 01:38:22,000
, 01:38:22:00 , In the early sixties,
1171
01:38:22,000 --> 01:38:25,130
, 01:38:25:00 , the Watts Towers were the first world's most accessible,
1172
01:38:25,130 --> 01:38:52,000
, 01:38:28:00 , most user-friendly civic monument.
1173
01:38:52,000 --> 01:38:55,000
, 01:38:55:00 , Fred Halsted's gay porn masterpiece
1174
01:38:55,000 --> 01:38:58,000
, 01:38:57:00 , recapitulates the loss of Eden,
1175
01:38:58,000 --> 01:39:00,130
, 01:39:00:00 , moving from the idyllic rural canyons
1176
01:39:00,130 --> 01:39:17,120
, 01:39:03:00 , to the already mean streets of Hollywood.
1177
01:39:17,120 --> 01:39:19,130
, 01:39:19:12 , As the landscape becomes more urban,
1178
01:39:19,130 --> 01:39:32,050
, 01:39:22:00 , the sex gets rougher.
1179
01:39:32,050 --> 01:39:37,000
, 01:39:36:00 , Continental European directors
1180
01:39:37,000 --> 01:39:40,000
, 01:39:39:13 , so they appreciate Los Angeles,
1181
01:39:40,000 --> 01:39:42,000
, 01:39:42:00 , even the tacky stuff we hate,
1182
01:39:42,000 --> 01:39:47,000
, 01:39:44:00 , like the Sunset Strip.
1183
01:39:47,000 --> 01:39:50,000
, 01:39:49:15 , In The Outside Man by Jacques Deray,
1184
01:39:50,000 --> 01:39:53,000
, 01:39:53:00 , a Parisian hit man stranded in Los Angeles
1185
01:39:53,000 --> 01:39:57,000
, 01:39:55:00 , discovers a city of parking lots,
1186
01:39:57,000 --> 01:39:59,000
, 01:39:58:00 , motels,
1187
01:39:59,000 --> 01:40:04,000
, 01:40:00:13 , bus stations,
1188
01:40:04,000 --> 01:40:11,130
, 01:40:05:13 , coffee shops,
1189
01:40:11,130 --> 01:40:17,000
, 01:40:13:00 , strip bars,
1190
01:40:17,000 --> 01:40:22,000
, 01:40:19:00 , and real estate opportunities.
1191
01:40:22,000 --> 01:40:24,130
, 01:40:24:00 , It's all quite ugly, I suppose,
1192
01:40:24,130 --> 01:40:29,130
, 01:40:29:00 , but it adds up to a precise portrait of the city in 1973,
1193
01:40:29,130 --> 01:40:38,000
, 01:40:31:00 , just as I remember it.
1194
01:40:38,000 --> 01:40:41,000
, 01:40:41:00 , Like most Europeans in southern California,
1195
01:40:41,000 --> 01:40:46,000
, 01:40:45:00 , Antonioni was more interested in the desert than in the city.
1196
01:40:46,000 --> 01:40:49,000
, 01:40:49:00 , If you should ever find yourself in Death Valley in August,
1197
01:40:49,000 --> 01:40:53,000
, 01:40:52:00 , you will hear more German spoken than English.
1198
01:40:53,000 --> 01:40:56,000
, 01:40:55:13 , But before heading for Zabriskie Point,
1199
01:40:56,000 --> 01:41:00,130
, 01:41:00:00 , Antonioni took his protagonist on a high tourist spin around Los Angeles,
1200
01:41:00,130 --> 01:41:06,130
, 01:41:05:13 , starting with the now-famous murals at the Farmer John's meat packing plant in Vernon,
1201
01:41:06,130 --> 01:41:09,000
, 01:41:09:00 , later featured in Brian De Palma's Carrie
1202
01:41:09,000 --> 01:42:15,130
, 01:41:11:00 , and Jon Jost's Angel City.
1203
01:42:15,130 --> 01:42:20,000
, 01:42:20:00 , His tour of industrial Los Angeles ended abruptly and improbably
1204
01:42:20,000 --> 01:42:44,000
, 01:42:22:00 , at Sunset and Rodeo.
1205
01:42:44,000 --> 01:42:48,130
, 01:42:48:00 , Jacques Demy loved Los Angeles as only a tourist can.
1206
01:42:48,130 --> 01:42:50,000
, 01:42:50:00 , Or maybe I should say,
1207
01:42:50,000 --> 01:42:53,130
, 01:42:52:00 , as only a French tourist can.
1208
01:42:53,130 --> 01:42:56,000
, 01:42:56:00 , I resented Model Shop when it came out
1209
01:42:56,000 --> 01:42:58,130
, 01:42:58:13 , because it was a westside movie.
1210
01:42:58,130 --> 01:43:00,000
, 01:43:00:00 , Its vision of the city
1211
01:43:00,000 --> 01:43:03,000
, 01:43:02:00 , didn't extend east of Vine Street.
1212
01:43:03,000 --> 01:43:04,130
, 01:43:04:13 , But now I can appreciate
1213
01:43:04,130 --> 01:43:09,000
, 01:43:08:00 , an early poignant attempt to defend Los Angeles as a city.
1214
01:43:09,000 --> 01:43:11,000
, 01:43:11:00 , It's totally incoherent,
1215
01:43:11,000 --> 01:43:15,130
, 01:43:14:00 , but if you live here, you have to be moved.
1216
01:43:15,130 --> 01:43:17,000
, 01:43:17:00 , "I was driving down Sunset, ...
1217
01:43:17,000 --> 01:43:20,000
, 01:43:20:00 , ... and I turned on one of those roads that lead up into the hills, ...
1218
01:43:20,000 --> 01:43:22,000
, 01:43:22:00 , ... and I stopped at this place that overlooks the whole city.
1219
01:43:22,000 --> 01:43:24,000
, 01:43:24:00 , ... It was fantastic. ...
1220
01:43:24,000 --> 01:43:26,130
, 01:43:26:00 , I suddenly felt exhilarated.
1221
01:43:26,130 --> 01:43:29,000
, 01:43:29:00 , I was really moved by the geometry of the place,
1222
01:43:29,000 --> 01:43:32,130
, 01:43:31:13 , its conception, its baroque harmony.
1223
01:43:32,130 --> 01:43:35,000
, 01:43:34:00 , It's a fabulous city.
1224
01:43:35,000 --> 01:43:39,000
, 01:43:39:00 , To think some people claim it's an ugly city when it's really pure poetry,
1225
01:43:39,000 --> 01:43:41,030
, 01:43:41:00 , it just kills me.
1226
01:43:41,030 --> 01:43:43,050
, 01:43:43:03 , I wanted to build something right then,
1227
01:43:43,050 --> 01:43:45,000
, 01:43:44:13 , create something.
1228
01:43:45,000 --> 01:43:46,000
, 01:43:46:00 , Do you know what I mean?"
1229
01:43:46,000 --> 01:43:53,000
, 01:43:48:00 , "Yeah, I do. I understand."
1230
01:43:53,000 --> 01:43:59,000
, 01:43:57:00 , The opinion expressed by Raquel Welch in Flareup is more typical.
1231
01:43:59,000 --> 01:44:06,130
, 01:44:01:00 , "It's better from up here than down close."
1232
01:44:06,130 --> 01:44:09,000
, 01:44:09:00 , Roman Polanski later stole her line
1233
01:44:09,000 --> 01:44:11,000
, 01:44:11:00 , and improved upon it:
1234
01:44:11,000 --> 01:44:15,130
, 01:44:14:00 , "There's no more beautiful city in the world...
1235
01:44:15,130 --> 01:44:17,130
, 01:44:18:13 , provided it's seen by night and from a distance."
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