|
Image ProblemJohn Sayles can write a good story, but can he tell it visually?
HONEYDRIPPER | 
DIRECTED AND WRITTEN BY JOHN SAYLES
By Jonathan Rosenbaum January 17, 2008
It may seem like dirty pool to begin a discussion of one of my favorite John Sayles movies by zeroing in on its weak points. But writing about Honeydripper recently in the New Yorker, David Denby noted that “moviemaking seems to have become almost magically easy for this independent writer-director,” and that’s absurd, since Sayles himself wrote in the introduction to his story collection Dillinger in Hollywood that “getting a movie made resembles the passage of a bill through Congress.” Denby concedes that Sayles’s virtuosity as a writer-director “is rhetorical rather than visual.” And Sayles himself says that when he gets a story idea that “seems best expressed in fiction, I feel it in words, not pictures.”
The brief flashback in the middle of Honeydripper’s climactic sequence is a good indication of how labored Sayles’s treatment of images continues to be. The flashback—it comes when Tyrone “Pine Top” Purvis (Danny Glover) is about to break up a fight between a couple of angry customers in his Honeydripper Lounge—isn’t just clunky as visual storytelling and phony in its florid, bloody action and garish setting, it’s seriously underimagined. We get a sudden glimpse of Purvis as a young man pulling a knife on somebody in a fancy city club, suggesting that he gave up his career as a professional musician and retreated to the sticks to escape from the law after killing somebody. Now he’s a peacemaker persuading two hotheads to relinquish their weapons, but there’s no connection of the character to his cliched earlier self.
The movie’s uncommon pleasures derive not from any comprehensively created world but from its cast—mostly African-American veterans of the Broadway stage, of productions of August Wilson plays in particular—and Sayles’s graceful way of handling them. The plot is inspired by (rather than adapted from) “Keeping Time,” a Sayles story about a drummer published 15 years ago in Rolling Stone and collected in Dillinger in Hollywood. The story has more atmospherics than plot, but part of the movie’s narrative thread is derived from it. And not surprisingly, Sayles’s prose owes most of its energy to verbal riffs on black slang rather than to any abiding sense of lived experience.
Sayles’s theme in Honeydripper, as in “Keeping Time,” has to do with the birth of rock and roll. The movie is set in 1950, and Purvis—who used to be a boogie-woogie piano player—is now the proprietor of a struggling juke joint on the outskirts of Harmony, Alabama. Purvis is behind on rent, and he and his friend and partner Maceo (the wonderful Charles S. Dutton) have just been forced to fire their aged blues singer (Mable John) because they can’t pay her. Meanwhile the gangsters who own the building are threatening to sell it; after they send over a couple of thugs, Purvis dreams up a scam and claims that the famous Guitar Sam is coming to put on a show. The sheriff (Stacy Keach) runs Harmony like a petty despot, demanding cash payoffs—and fried chicken from Purvis’s churchgoing wife (Lisa Gay Hamilton). He also harasses a young guitarist (Gary Clark Jr.), Sonny, who’s passing through, citing him for vagrancy and forcing him to pick cotton. Desperate, Purvis enlists Sonny—who’s been flirting with his teenage stepdaughter, China Doll (Yaya DaCosta)—to impersonate Guitar Sam.
This is only part of the agreeably complicated plot and large cast of characters, which also includes a blind blues singer (Keb’ Mo’) playing for pennies on the street who acts as deus ex machina. His music sounds real enough, but the idea that he could beg playing that kind of music for the white folks strikes me as unbelievable. Also, Sayles writes in the press notes that “one [battle] for dominance that was waged in the early ’50s was between the guitar and the piano.” Maybe he’s right, but Purvis’s piano playing (dubbed by Sonny Leland and articulated in close-ups by the hands of Henderson Huggins) and Clark’s live electric guitar suggest a relationship between stride piano, boogie-woogie, R & B, and early Chuck Berry that’s hard to accept musically, though I can buy it dramatically. It’s typical of the way Sayles, for all his concern about getting the locale and period right, is also concocting a Porgy and Bess fantasy. (Purvis in the flashback and the two thugs are all versions of Sportin’ Life.)
Though Honeydripper is Sayles’s 16th feature, he clearly still thinks more in words than in pictures—words that sometimes seem better suited to the page than to the screen. And in this film, the lived experience of the cast may ultimately count for more than Sayles’s own. Speaking as a native of Alabama who was seven in 1950, I’d argue that the only cast member, white or black, who speaks with an authentic Alabama accent is Sayles himself, appearing in only one scene as a testy liquor salesman.
When I saw Honeydripper in Toronto and New York, it was with appreciative, almost all white audiences. (I’m told by a dramaturge friend that Broadway productions of August Wilson plays about the African-American experience also have mostly white audiences.) I suspect this is because Sayles’s movies are marketed like art movies, meaning they’re marginalized by definition. Last week in the Reader J.R. Jones protested that the animated feature Persepolis was handled the same way. True enough, but I’d argue that’s lamentable not just because the film reveals Iranians to be people like us but because one scene, when the teenage heroine casually gets a boy arrested as a practical joke, shows how easy it is for anyone to slide into totalitarian behavior.
Marginalizing Honeydripper means depriving mainstream audiences of mainstream entertainment. Glover’s as hard-rock reliable as Spencer Tracy in his prime, Dutton’s exchanges of sexual innuendo with an appreciative lady friend are delivered with a kind of relish verging on joy, and DaCosta and Clark make a cute couple. The music is a pleasure throughout. Keach and Mary Steenburgen turn in juicy performances—in fact, everybody on-screen seems to be enjoying themselves. So pretending that this is an art film just seems like a way of guaranteeing that some people who’d enjoy it won’t ever see it. 
Opens Fri 1/18 at the Music Box and other theaters.
For more on movies, see our blog On Film. Send a letter to the editor.
From the Reader blogs On Film J.R. Jones: Rosenbaum redux.
4/30 at 12:41 pm
|
![[Chicago Reader: Best of Chicago -- VOTE NOW!]](/homepage-buttons/Best-of-Chicago-vote-now.gif)
![[THE WELL - Click here for drink specials]](http://media.chicagoreader.com/homepage-buttons/drink-specials-THE-WELL-pints-cocktails.gif)
Digg this
Post to del.icio.us
E-mail this to a friend
Flag as inappropriate
Ira Deutchman at 1:36 PM on 1/17/2008
Hey Jonathan,
Thanks for the thoughtful review. As for its distribution, we agree that the film should not be marketed as an art film. Check out the theaters where it is opening in Chicago and you'll see that there are six of them, appealing to a pretty broad audience. On the same day, we're opening 12 theaters in Atlanta. We're making a very strong effort to get the word out to African American audiences all over the country. Anyway, I couldn't let this go by without commenting.
--Ira
Flag as inappropriate
Jonathan R. at 3:52 PM on 1/17/2008
Thanks, Ira; I stand corrected. I was actually aware of your effort from the film's press book, but knowing the way that Sayles films are usually treated in the media, I was still fearing the worst, despite your intentions--something I would have gotten into if I'd had more space. So I'm sorry for the over- simplification.
Checking the Chicago and suburban venues that we have listed (I count three in the paper edition, not six), what I see at a glance is Music Box (our main arthouse), a South Side multiplex, and a suburban multiplex--but not, say, AMC River East. Still, one can only hope.
Best,
Jonathan
Flag as inappropriate
Dee at 4:30 PM on 1/17/2008
After viewing the screening in Atlanta on Wednesday night I could only stand and applaud the good feeling I had after viewing this film. Sure there were some dots that appeared to not connect all of the time however, the overall artistry and cinema-savvy ingredient blend made it a very enjoyable evening of fun. I would definitely encourage people to get out and see this film. Glover and Dutton deliver performances as rock solid as Rushmore..........the rest of the cast wasn't a slack either, including the originator himself.
Flag as inappropriate
Hoss at 6:47 PM on 1/18/2008
John Sayles is the Jackson Browne of filmmaking. Intelligent, well-meaning, hard-working, sincere... but predictable, conventional, bland, generic, didactic, etc. His only near-great film is Baby It's You, not least because it's just about two kids than Big Themes.
---
Rosenbaum says the audience for 'Honeydripper' was mostly white and why? Because it was 'marginalized as an art movie'. Huh? It used to be marginalization meant lack of cross over appeal. Now, a film is said to be marginalized because it has cross-over appeal! It is marginalized because whites, who make up the ruling majority in the US, make up most of the audience. What kind of assumptions lead to such funny idea?
First assumption is that it's always white people's fault, especially that of white capitalists who rule the entertainment industry. Yes, white media goons don't want blacks to see the latest Sayles movie. And, how did they keep the brothers away? By marginalizing the movie as 'an art film'. Considering that our media are mostly run by liberals, one wonders why this is so. Is it because liberal white art house audiences don't want to see fancy art movies alongside rowdy blacks? So, white liberals are bigots too? Or, is it because the powerful suits in Hollywood and tyrannical media moguls just can't resist getting their jollies by sabotaging black themed movies that might appeal to blacks. Just imagine some Jewish Hollywood Mogul thinking, "Hey, the latest Sayles movie might be a big hit with the blacks. Let's sabotage it as an art film and attract only whites." As conspiracies go, I guess it's no worse than black helicopters or 'since when did steel melt?'--9/11.
I guess liberals in the film world have their subtle racist methods too for keeping colored folks away, and God Bless Ronsenbaum for sounding the alarm.
But, most fans of jazz at concerts and clubs are white too. And, more white people listen to Motown hits of the 60s than do blacks. And there are more whites than blacks at reggae and blues concerts. Oh my, I guess those have also been purposely and perniciously 'marginalized' as art music, presumably to pull in rich whites and keep blacks away. And, if we follow Rosenbaum's logic, blacks are allergic to Art as Dracula is to garlic. Those childlike and natural blacks would never sit thru art films and serious stuff. They only go for hysterical populism and immediate gratification.
Seriously, more sensible would be NOT TO PLAY COPS AND ROBBERS. I would agree that the concept of Art Film can be negative as well as positive in drawing audiences. Too often, some lousy film gets much attention because it's an ART FILM and receives undeserved plaudits. But, sometimes, a film deemed an Art wards off potential audience as too 'challenging' or 'difficult'.
I would also say that there is something anti-intellectual, anti-cultural, and amnesiac in the black community. At just about every showing of important African films, the audience is usually mostly or all white. And,this in a city that has over a million blacks, among whom many are well-educated and affluent. The blame must be put on black attitudes toward art.
Of course, blacks may take satisfaction in the notion that they are creators, pioneers, and adventurers, too busy inventing new stuff to look back--at least in music and dance--while white boys, lacking creativity themselves, work on preservation, criticism, celebration, and remembrance. After all, though the leading lights in Blues and Jazz have been black, almost all writers and historians on the subject have been white. So, blacks may feel that rock n roll is old hat, no longer relevant to what's happening today. Leave it up to whites to collect antique records, write books, and make movies on that stuff.
And, it must be said that rock n roll/Rock was designed essentially for white kids than for black kids. Even in the 50s, it was white kids who were into Presley, Berry, and Richards while many black kids disdained them as too mainstream--white.
At any rate, the main reason for this movie's limited appeal has little to do with 'marginalization'. Pulp Fiction was sold as an Art Movie yet was popular with everyone. My Big Fat Greek Wedding also started out as an Art Movie but made over 200 million. On the other hand, Flags of Our Fathers and Letters From Iwo Jima were promoted as Big Hollywood movies but only garnered art film appreciation.
Why? There are so many factors. I'm sure promotional budgets play a role, as well as size of production values and big stars. Honeydripper has no big flashy stars, is not lavishly produced like "Ray" or "Walk the Line", Sayles is not a sensationalistic director, and so on.
At any rate, the problem is not that this film was sold as art but few blacks are into film as Art. Rosenbaum castigates whites for lack of such enthusiasm so why not with blacks? Why won't blacks--even most educated middle class folks--come to art films or see Honeydripper because it's an Art Film when white people seem to have no problem with the label? Why are they less likely to listen or attend blues and jazz concerts than whites? Too artsy for them?
And, what of the near total lack of interest among blacks for non-black culture. How many blacks are open-minded enough to give Greek music a try? Do blacks care about Mariachi music? It seems blacks need to be more open-minded, more liberal, more curious. Yet, political correctness forbids pointing this out. Instead, blacks are the victims of Honeydripper being 'marginalized as an art film'. Bull Connors doesn't unleash dogs on blacks no more but labels movies as 'art' to keep the colored away.
Flag as inappropriate
B.W. at 11:45 AM on 1/21/2008
I don't know why I'm even dignifying "Hoss" with a response, but I have to point out the idiocy of saying that "blacks need to be more open-minded more liberal, more curious." Are you really implying that race has something to do with American culture's relative lack of interest in art films? Or are you just trying to be a controversial race-baiter? Jonathan pointed out the sad fact that this movie probably won't reach lots of people who would enjoy it--you would blame this on those people themselves? They should be checking the Reader's film webpage every weekend? They should be current on the Music Box's newsletter? Come on. Nobody has a responsibility to be "artsy," to use your word, regardless of race. It's up to distributors, advertisers, and perhaps critics (a favorable Honeydripper review was posted on Roger Ebert's site this week--perhaps that will help get word out). Please take your racism elsewhere--the Reader is no place for it.
Flag as inappropriate
Ssoh at 11:58 AM on 1/25/2008
What a monotonous bore is Hoss. No doubt a former high school hall monitor.
Since the flyspeck has obviously never had a date in "his" life, maybe someone should suggest "his" next wad-shot should be in the direction of Nyomi Marcela.
Flag as inappropriate
Hoss is Boss at 8:36 PM on 2/22/2008
Hoss has a point. Rosenbaum's review implies there is a division within the so-called liberal community between blacks and whites. What white liberals like, blacks don't. What blacks like, whites may not. To be sure, the alliance isn't between two liberal groups but a liberal group and a tribal group. White liberals wanna go beyond white interests whereas blacks want to further black interests within this alliance. There is a similar alliance between white leftists and Muslim groups in Western Europe. Politics makes strange bedfellows.
There are cultural differences too. White liberals flatter themselves as broadening their cultural experience to include non-white cultures and arts. Blacks generally like to stick to their own stuff; because 'black' is considered a minority culture in the US, blacks can stick only to black culture and still make claims of being 'open-minded' whereas whites MUST venture beyond the majority-mainstream white culture. Same applies to sports. Because blacks were historically kept out of sports, having more blacks on a team means it's more inclusive and 'diverse'... even when the team has become all black! Following this logic, a basketball team that's all black may be considered more 'inclusive' than one which is half white, half black. We applaud the appearance of every new black quarterblack but aren't bothered by the fact that all running backs are black and that the position is defacto forbidden to all non-blacks permanently.
Flag as inappropriate
Hoss is Boss at 8:37 PM on 2/22/2008
Now, consider the strange Rock n Roll and Rock phenomenon where fans were overwhelmingly white. Though both Rock n Roll and Rock were substantially derived from black sources, blacks saw them as watered-down and lame versions of black music or as examples of whites 'stealing' from black culture. As much as Dylan learned from blacks, blacks were NOT listening to Dylan. As much as Springsteen like to make overtures to blacks, few blacks buy his albums or show up at his concerts. And, it was not blacks who made Paul Simon's Graceland an huge hit. If anything, Simon was denounced and attacked as a 'thief' when he visited Howard University. To be sure, some of this black anger is justifiable as whites long ago made huge profits by making black music palatable to white folks... while original black composers saw little or none of the profits--most of which ended up in the pockets of Jewish agents and bosses. I wonder if Farrakhan's lifelong hatred for Jews has something to do with his personal experience in the music industry.
Anyway, divisions in the 'liberal' community exist along racial lines; this is also true among ethnic lines. Jewish-American liberals tend to be more intellectual and culturally involved than Polish-American liberals. The reasons for this are complex and cannot simply be explained by the 'marginalization' of certain works of art or entertainment; also, this 'marginalization' was largely self-imposed by people like Rosenbaum who hold their noses up at most mainstream movies. It's a self-made ghetto of privilege and purism.
Flag as inappropriate
Hoss is Boss at 8:37 PM on 2/22/2008
Then, the fault--if it is a fault--lies in the behavior/sensibilities of blacks and white liberals. The fact is there are many areas where blacks and white liberals just don't see eye to eye.
If Rosenbaum is bothered by the racial segregation within the 'liberal' community, then he can fix the problem by going to see the kinds of movies blacks generally like. If Barbershop 3 or another Will Smith blockbuster comes to the screen, Rosenbaum only needs to go to a multi-plex in the heart of Chicago. Problem is Rosenbaum the white liberal generally doesn't like these kinds of movies which most blacks do. And of course, art theaters would be more integrated if blacks were more interested in art/serious/personal films. But, they are not. Then, the problem lies--if it is a problem--with the differing tastes and expectations of white liberals and blacks. It's disingenious to blame the 'system'. Never mind "Honeydripper". When Lee's Malcolm X was released, it was hyped all over, in both white and black community. But, most of the audiences and admirers were white liberals, not blacks, many of whom found it boring. Indeed, most of Spike Lee's films have been championed and seen mostly by white liberals than blacks. The Lee phenom wouldn't have been possible without white liberal support.
Also, the fact is blacks are not into Sayles or Jackson Browne or Graham Parker or even Chuck Berry; even the great Hendrix was vastly more popular with whites than with blacks. (It could also be argued that there wasn't a distinctly youth-oriented black culture prior to rap and hip hop. Rhythm n Blues, Soul, and Disco appealed to youth and adults alike; in contrast, rock n roll and rock were clearly about white youth vs white grown-up. Maybe this is because black adults in the 50s and 60s were hipper, cooler, and wilder than their white counterparts and therefore less of an obstacle to young blacks. And, even rap wasn't a rebellion against the black adult culture since black adult culture vanished with the demise of the black family starting in the 60s; violence of rock n roll derived from white kids resisting white adult culture whereas violence of rap derives from black youth triumphalism in a landscape of no adult resistance). To be sure, racial tribalism exists in both camps; many white guys are only into white rock, ignoring the black origins of the music--but, then blacks totally ignore the white origins of much of 'black music'.
The group that is most open-minded about culture are white liberals who don't even make up the majority of whites. But, even among white liberals only a small percentage are fans of personal or art filmmaking. Sayles is not a Godard or Resnais but he is an art filmmaker in the sense that he follows his own heart--like Woody Allen, Noah Baumbach, Richard Linklater(probably why a great film like Dazed and Confused failed at the box office as opposed to stuff like Fast Times at Ridgmont High and Breakfast Club). As such, he doesn't pander as much to audience expectations as much as the average Hollywood director; he's not Ron Howard.
Flag as inappropriate
Hoss is Boss at 8:38 PM on 2/22/2008
I find Sayles anemic and dull, rather like a vegan version of Robert Redford. Though he made a movie about blacks, it's not the REAL THING to blacks. It probably doesn't FEEL authentically black but only correctly black--same reason why blacks don't listen to white musical performers. Whites may be wowed by Joe Cocker or Janis Joplin's bluesy imitations but blacks may regard them as pale ripoffs.
Honeydripper sounds like a movie equivalent of that duet by Jackson Browne and Springsteen's black saxophonist--"You're a Friend of Mine". It wasn't black folks who bought that record but white liberals gushing over such ebony/ivory sentiments.
Like the liberal Jewish guy who made STARTING OUT IN THE EVENING, Rosenbaum probably wants there to be some spiritual union between white liberals--especially Jews--and blacks. In STARTING OUT, a black guy finds out that he's partly Jewish. The purpose of such contrivance on the part of the writer-director? Perhaps, to idealize a situation where a black guy discovers he's a spiritual brother of the wonderful Jew. Yes, blacks owe Jews for progressive ideology, NAACP, financial backing, intellectual support, etc. "When will you black guys realize that WE are brothers, friends. Yes, FRIENDS?" In other words, stop hanging around guys like Al Sharpton and Louis Farrakhan and support Israel. Since white liberals can't criticize blacks directly, they do it indirectly, underhandedly.
Of course, in reality, there are huge divisions between the black and liberal Jewish community. Instead of looking at the real divisions, tensions, and differences, guys like Rosenbaum wanna indulge in the fantasy of Popular Front to defeat the COMMON enemy--white conservatives, who are to blame for all the evils in the world.
So, if Rosenbaum taught in a black school and screened an art movie, whereupon black kids rose up and threw chairs at him, Ronsenbaum wouldn't blame crude black populism or his elitism. No, he would most likely blame the design of the chairs, surely the fault of evil white corporation that made them. "It's the system, Man!"
Flag as inappropriate
Hoss is Boss at 8:38 PM on 2/22/2008
Rosenbaum is divorced from reality. The roots of Rock n Roll were largely black, but rock n roll--like Sayle's movies--didn't appeal to blacks. During the heyday of Berry, Richards, Presley, and Holly, blacks had their own brand of pop music. Jazz-blacks saw rock n roll as stupid, and rhythm n blues & soul blacks thought it was clunky watered down black music for white suburban teens. And, in the 60s, whites had their music and blacks had theirs. Anyone who's been to a Grateful Dead concert knows it was strictly for whites. Grateful Dead would have welcomed blacks, but blacks didn't see Garcia as their god or guru. So, who's to blame for this state of affairs? Was Dead Music ever marginalized as 'art music'? If not, why did blacks stay away, as they also stayed away from Peter Gabriel, U2, and Springsteen concerts--despite the endless overtures made by these white rockers to the black community?
Also, if lack of interest in world culture is a form of bigotry, then blacks surely have a problem of cultural bigotry. Despite exceptions, overwhelming number of blacks--even educated blacks--only listen to black music and know only black history. Among young blacks, it's overwhelmingly contemporary black music. I doubt if most Jazz and blues artists could make a living if not for white liberal audience. I dare say white conservatives are more likely to be appreciative of blues and jazz than many black kids whose idea of culture is Hollywood blockbusters, TV shows, hip hop, etc.
Also, did Rosenbaum ever ask why Art Film came to take on pejorative meaning? Maybe it has something to do with the likes of him turning it into some sickly cult where a 'masterpiece' is a non-movie with non-characters standing around doing nothing for 4 or 5 hrs? Never mind 'who put the bomp?' Who took the fun out of cinema? Some yrs back, Ebert made a dig at the likes of Rosenbaum when he complained more and more art films at festivals are minimalist and puritanical mannerisms of nothingness so far removed from the glorious unabashed and energetic spirit of the 50s and 60s. Don't blame the system. Blame the idiot mobs and elitist snobs.
Add a comment