08-07-21 Yanke Doodle Dandy (1942)

Seen: July 6th, 2008
Format: DVD
Rating: 9

My girlfriend was the one who talked me into this film. She was born outside the States and moved here when she was nine. This is a favorite film of her family's, which they generally watched together on the Fourth.

If you've read the entries for The Roaring Twenties or The Public Enemy then you know that I'm pretty impressed by James Cagney. Mo had a reverse of my experience. She first knew Cagney as George M. Cohan, the focus of this film. She had great difficulty reconciling this character with the ones she encountered when she sought out his other films.

Talk about shattering youthful delusions.

Basically, this film is a Cagney tour de force. He had a great reputation as a vaudeville man, and he pulls out all the stops in his interpretation of Cohan. He's a dance machine. It's simply stunning to watch the control that he has over his body, and the utter confidence with which he moves. I'm left lacking superlatives. His singing, while hardly iconic, is rich, committed and suits the character well.

Put his amazing performance together with very capable performances from supporting actors, with a thoroughly American tale told in a straightforward manner and you've got the makings of a classic.

What's remarkable about the writing is how unsentimental it is. While it's not completely devoid of nostalgia, it walks a fine line between presenting the story and becoming too involved in it. This is true as well with it's patriotic nature. This is not a patriotic film, but it is the screen biography of a very patriotic man living in patriotic times.

It's a very honest effort which doesn't work to win us over, instead letting the characters tell us their story.If we have any heart at all, we'll do the winning ourselves at that point.

See this film. See it with your family, with your friends, prehaps an immigrant. See it and remember what it is means to really become and be an American, instead of just wearing the label.

The Good: A heartwarming, true, All-American tale with an incredible performance.
The Bad: Being framed
The Ugly: How far we've fallen from this tree

What (the heck) happened, and maybe some progress...

If you're reading this, you just might care, so here's what's been going on, and why the blog's been pretty much dead over the last 5+ months.

Basically, I fell in love. Again.

Shortly before the hiatus, I made a long trip to a far away city to visit family. The city is the one that I happened to have gone to college in. While I was there, I looked up an old friend, one whom I had loved very deeply and with which I had a beautiful and tragic romance. Fast forward a number of years, actually a great number of years, and here we were again.

There was dinner; and late night drinks and later night coffee. There was staring intently into each others eyes at a Farmer's Market. There was long distance romance, huge phone bills and frequent weekend flights.

Then, just before Christmas, on Dec. 21st, there was a 26' Penske diesel full of my crap driving a thousand plus miles to move in. Some months followed as did another Penske (highly recommended) with the rest of the junk.

And basically I've been busy being in love, adjusting to a new/old city and a new job, and trying to change in a few dozen other ways at the same time.

It occupies my time. I just haven't had the 3 hours a day required to watch and write.

I HAVE seen some film. My new SO, who we'll call Mo, actually convinced our alma mater to construct a BFA film program for her and was it's first graduate. She's all about the film too, and has actually studied it extensively, and so keeps me on my toes.

Hopefully some reviews will follow, though I'm not going to guarantee any particular frequency.

Thanks for your support.