“In a region of desperate poverty, four men are hired by an oil company to drive trucks filled with nitroglycerin down treacherous mountain roads in the hot sun.”

This is likely the greatest setup for a film ever, and the first reading of it would send a chill down your spine. The tension is palpable before the film would even begin, as one bad jolt, one tank of nitroglycerin becomes overheated, a single rock slide at the wrong time, and the truck becomes one with the vapor. Moments in silence are no less removed from danger as the volatile fluid cooks in the sun. Hitchcock once noted that if a scene has a bomb in it, ‘show the audience the bomb’. And so this bomb is in full view, and you are left waiting for it to go off. In Wages of Fear, as he did with Diabolique, Henri-Georges Clouzot has made an unforgettable impact in the cinema of tension. A stunning work to be sure, but what makes it an indelible classic is the political statement contained within, one which remains timeless, unfortunately.

The small town in this story could be most anywhere – rural towns are nearly always starving for a source of income. Woe unto those that actually have a local industry, as the discovery of oil, diamonds, or any other lucrative resource only seems to deepen the poverty. Multinationals generally move in with a large investment, and with the promise of jobs and a payoff to the right people in government, the land is broken. Inevitably, the money goes only to the necessary government officials and to the company; the locals get nothing but irreversible disease and trauma. This town is no different. As Mario (a never-better Yves Montand) remarks dryly, “It is easy to get in, but you cannot get out.” People flocked in for work, but there was only work for skilled laborers, and there are no roads out, no trains, and a flight costs far more than anyone has in this decrepit hole. There is nothing to do but drink, subsist, and await the next bar fight. Malaria and leprosy are widespread, but the most common chronic illness is hunger. The entire population lives upon delirium, and works enough to stay in debt. The conscience of the town is within one wide-eyed kid who pleads to anyone in earshot about his work visa, and begs for money to flee to the United States. The greatest aspiration is to be elsewhere.

Clouzot maintains a tight grip upon the production, and even the wide open spaces of this desert town has a claustrophobic feel. In the opening shot, a child wallows in the mud, playing with cockroaches that have been tied together with string. They struggle against each other as they pull in mutually assured inertia – one of the truly great evocative images in populist cinema. Against this rabble is the monolithic SOC, an American oil company. “Where there is oil, Americans are not far behind.” Not much has changed in geopolitics since the 1950s, apart from China emerging as a major player in the petroleum market. Industrial practices are about the same – the work is dangerous, and unskilled locals are the preferred source since they do not have labor unions. Any effort by the proles to disrupt business is met with swift violence at the hands of the company’s private security. They run a tight ship, and brought the entire works and buildings prefabricated – even the cemetery for the workers came ready made.

There is an explosion at the oil drill, and the only way to extinguish the flaming oil gusher is with high explosives. Thus our story begins; still, the stakes would not be so high, nor the extraordinary pressure placed upon the laborers as resonant if Wages of Fear did not spend the first hour in languid character development. The tedium of nowhere in Venezuela is demonstrated in the daily pointless rhythms of boredom. Mario and his cohorts shoot the shit, pass the time, eat, drink, and threaten each other with regularity. There is a woman that Mario fancies, but she is hardly the object of his affection – there is no time or place for strong attachments in this unsentimental terminus. Some have accused Clouzot of misogyny for this indifferent attitude toward women, and the way the only significant female character is treated, but this is the way it is in the harsh places of the world. Women mean attachment, and such things are dangerous when there is little in the way of income. Soft women either become wily opportunists or broken romantics. There is only the work, and the catastrophe at the oil drill means a big payday for those able to survive – US$2000 is enough to escape to a new life. The odds against making a journey across the mountains in a rickety truck without a single jolt sending your nitroglycerin into orbit are astonishingly high, but in a true capitalist system, suicide is as profitable as it is necessary. There is little point withering away in the sun when you can gamble your life away for cash – and you either end up with the means to achieve your goals, or you are dead enough not to care. The Cato Institute would be proud of such a win-win situation.

Though this appears to be a film for the class warrior only, there is a more cynical edge at work here. The lower classes are at each others’ throats in the first act; with the introduction of Jo, a criminal from France who is fleeing the law, tempers flare. The workers are ready to brandish their weapons at a slight, even one so innocuous as turning off a radio in a bar. Several characters set upon each other at first, and these differences vanish once the deadly job appears. Perhaps if a page were borrowed from Upton Sinclair, then the unemployed masses would wreak vengeance upon the company for offering little more than death to its workers. This does not happen in the real world very often, mostly due to manipulation by the company owners, or internecine fighting amidst the workers, and so such a scene has little use in Wages of Fear. The largest character in the film utters nary a line, though it drives every single action – or inaction – that occurs. This character is Fear, that great motivator. It forms that magnificent pillar of supply and demand, and drives every living soul to work their waking moments. The job is offered, and the people line up around the block. There is no class struggle here, which is also strangely relevant to the present. The combination of fear and the drive to consume against a backdrop of globalization has left the world without a labor movement; consider Wages of Fear a harbinger of this world to come.

Apart from its relevance and its stunning depiction of the human spirit placed under impossible pressure, Wages of Fear is cracking entertainment. The scenes where a massive boulder is quietly removed from the road, or two trucks navigate a slippery platform hanging over a precipitous drop rank among the great moments of cinema. Given the leisurely introduction to the characters, the way they respond to their trial resonates with the viewer. Even the reserved quality of Mario fades after he bleeds every drop of his soul in service to SOC – by the time his jittery hands drive the truck into sight of the apocalyptic fire of the drill site, there is nothing left in him. This is one of those films that reaches into you, and leaves you utterly drained by the end. At least it does for those of us fortunate enough not to live under tests like this on a daily basis. For a significant portion of the world, these wages are paid with every morning light.

George Stevens’ Gunga Din is the sort of unapologetically ethnocentric adventure picture they don’t dare make anymore; a rousing, two-fisted flag-waver for all those who found Birth of a Nation a bit light in the laughs department, or who never tired of watching the Union Jack raised again and again over its proud colonial empire. It’s a film impossible to imagine in a post-Gandhi universe, yet one so swashbuckling in its naïve arrogance that it all but commands an ear-to-ear smile. And so it does, what with Cary Grant, Victor McLaglen, and Douglas Fairbanks, Jr. aboard as indestructible friends first, dedicated soldiers second, and faint, longing lovers only when the guns fall silent. Fairbanks, as Ballantine, is about to leave the service for marriage to Emmy (Joan Fontaine), but the few scenes with his wife-to-be are so strained and uncomfortable that it’s always clear he’ll dump her for greater glory with the fellas (who mock this heterosexual involvement from the shadows). It doesn’t help that he kisses her like she’s a slab of balsa wood. Worst of all, she wants to domesticate poor Ballantine, which means she’s even more of an enemy than the hated Thuggee band, a death-obsessed cult that numbers only in the hundreds, but is meant to stand in for all of India, as befitting the Hollywood racism of the time. They worship Kali, a cruel mother who demands that her followers strangle, shoot, and stab every last Englishman before, presumably, taking on the world. No attempt is made to understand these people; it’s enough that they are brown, bug-eyed, and devoid of humanity. The rest is just trivia.

As the story begins, the savage Indians are butchering the benevolent Brits as they seek only peace and quiet by which to loot and subdue the entire country. Our three heroes are joyously throwing a few bearded heathens out a window, which quickly establishes them as loveable lugs who can’t help but get into trouble. Their mischief even extends to attempted murder of an officer, as they so poison Ballantine’s replacement that he’s sent to the hospital. But it’s all in good fun, which is reflected in Grant’s spirited portrayal of a lad with contempt for every rule save the code of honor involving his brethren. He wants to fight for king and country, sure, but he’s also after assorted Indian treasure, whether it’s a buried cache of emeralds, or a lost city of gold, which is just where our dashing trio will make their final stand. Grant (as Cutter) is swiftly jailed for his pranks, but escapes with the help of an elephant and the ever-faithful Gunga Din, a water boy who lives to serve, so long as he’s serving the very men who have cruelly enslaved his homeland. Without hesitation, Din smashes the prison walls, frees Cutter, and leads him to the gold, which just happens to double as the mountain headquarters of the Thuggee faithful. Needless to say, Cutter is captured, though Din escapes to inform the other men. And so begins the real adventure of cheeky imperialism.

But what of our sweet Gunga Din? Played by Sam Jaffe (a Russian Jew!) as if he were the founder and CEO of Hollywood’s top supplier of bronzer, he’s like Marty Feldman in a diaper; always wide-eyed, shuffling, and in utter rapture at the prospect of shooting his own people for the British empire. He is devoid of any real trait save his lust for service, and even when no one is looking, he’s practicing the salute and marching technique of the overlord. That said, and despite his status as the Uncle Tom of the Orient, he is unfailing in his charm; more loyal pet than person, yes, but so damned cute we can’t help but root for his assimilation into a world not remotely his own. By the rules and logic of the day, he won’t survive the movie, but deep down, we can imagine a last-minute airlift off the mountain, a frantic wave goodbye, and a cut to his later years at a top prep academy, somehow more British inside and out. It’s likely the only reason this movie was even made, and it all but justifies a continued presence in the region from then until eternity. Left to their own devices, the Indians resort to sheer brutality, unprovoked attacks, and mindless devotion to an effete megalomaniac named Guru (Eduardo Ciannelli) — the cruel sadist who warmly channels Brando’s Kurtz, keeps a pit of snakes to reinforce even deeper stereotypes, and manages to steal off with whatever self-tanner Jaffe left in the trailer. There’s not much room for discussion when the Other is either murderously mad or childishly ignorant, but I have never let cultural elitism stand in the way of manly entertainment. Dehumanization has never been this much fun.

Once all the pieces are in place — Din’s destiny as the unexpected savior, the women dispatched to the sidelines, a few final snarls by the nasty Guru — we await the final assault on the Indian fortress. It’s meant to be a trap so that the British army is butchered with no means of escape, but Din, already dying from a bayonet wound that would have felled lesser men, scales the temple to blow his prized bugle, thereby alerting the approaching troops. The sound of the horn lets loose a tidal wave of murder, as the screen is quickly enveloped by dust, debris, and dying Indians. No sane man would attempt a corpse count at this late stage, but it surely ranks with any film of its type, then and now. Horses fall, bodies tumble from their perches, and in one orgiastic burst of bloodlust, the only good Indian becomes the proverbial dead Indian. Cutter pierces the air with one last jab at “Oriental cruelty”, only to watch his beloved friend (mascot) die for England’s sins. And for his sacrifice, Din will be posthumously inducted into the British army, given a suitable rank, and carried away on a stretcher, remembered forever in a poem by Rudyard Kipling, who is conveniently on hand for both the final battle and Gunga’s martyrdom. “You’re a better man than I am, Gunga Din,” Kipling’s ode concludes, which might be touching if we had any idea who the little man actually was. For once, a good time trumps a lesson learned.

Total Perfection

1. It’s Actually About  Cockfighting. When I first saw the title of this movie, I wondered if it was really even about a Cockfighter.  We live in such strange times that, while films about sexually sadistic serial killers have become boring, the idea of a film about a guy who fights roosters seems impossibly taboo.  So I worried that this might be bad love story that producer, Roger Corman, has provocatively titled based on 5 minutes of wedged in stock footage.  But this movie is centered around cockfighting, just as surely as California Split is centered around gambling and The 300 is centered around homosexual fascism. Our protagonist Frank (well played by Warren “Adam” Oates) travels the circuit in search of  relative status and wealth, and the “cockfight of the year” medallion.  In fact, he has taken a vow of silence until he wins the coveted medallion and the bulk of the film simply follows that quest.  You know what word is used at least 300 times in this movie?  ‘Cock!’

The bookclub discusses Tolstoy this week.

2.  The Seedy South. The South really is a glorious institution if you strip away their religion and the moral putrefaction that comes with it and thus expose the magnificent, half-assed, low-lives that have always been at it’s core. In “Cockfighter,” living in a trailer is part of touring the back roads free of obligation, not merely finding the cheapest place to get fat.  If you’ve read the old stories of Southern gamblers like TJ Cloutier, you’ll recognize the calm disappointment expressed when a pool of gamblers are robbed at shotgun point, as opposed the pants-shitting panic you would experience in the same situation.  You see the same mellowness from an onlooker when Jack shoves the head of a boy who attacked him into a water trough.  The gentlemen casually removes his pipe to observe, “you best not hold him under there too long, Mr. Mansfield, he’s like to get drowned.”

There’s something appealing and perhaps even romantic about cobbling together a lifestyle and even a bit of cash while moving through the economic and cultural tundra of the deep South.  You travel about, cleaning up at the event of the year in a particular locality: a relief to those seeking fresh air from the suffocating snobbery of Southern wrestling circuit. A score of decrepit illiterates forms a circle to bet on fighting animals.  Though easily mistaken for a meeting of the Mississippi state senate, this is where you fleece hapless yokels of their moonshine money.  The low life has it’s allure, and this is as low as it gets.  The definitive moment on this front comes when legal concerns lead to one tournament being held in a hotel suite.  A final objection is addressed when it is proclaimed that “dead cocks will be stacked in the bathtub.”

3. Cock Talk. While a film called “Cockfighter” is bound to be replete with double entendre, these screenwriters have come up with a script consisting almost entirely of double entendre.  Our protagonist has taken a vow of silence, but partners up with another “cocksman” who says before the big match, “no matter how we come out tomorrow, I’ll always be grateful to you for taking me this far.”  And that’s one of about five sentences without the word ‘cock.’  Frank’s sporadically grandiloquent partner raises a toast to “the mystic realm of the great cock!  A monument!”

No, you can't borrow it.

4.  High Fashion. You know how if you corner a chick with a couple of brain cells about liking Sex In The City, she’ll eventually claim she really just loves the clothes?  Should you ever find yourself in the uncouth company of  a person incapable of appreciating fighting roosters, cock talk, hillbilly degeneracy and wonton misogyny you can always point to the splendiferous wardrobe used in this film.  In the best of times, the culture warp that is the American South draws in an inferior and dated version of what is hot on the streets of civilization.  So the bumpkin’s take on fashion in the 1970’s is something to behold.   I mean, we all own a chocolate colored suit or two, but who has had the vision to adorn it with a gold and purple, leopard skin?

Cock on Cock Action.

5.  Educational Value. Just as Rounders helped lay the groundwork for the Texas hold ‘em explosion by laying out the basic rules and appeal of the game, Cockfighter seems to provide a fairly accurate and interesting depiction of the cockfighting game.  The minimal rules and the flow of the action are sketched out in some earlier matches so that we can watch the critical battles with understanding.  The cockfights are well filmed and dramatic, especially when you learn that many of the fights were real.  Of course, we as a society have  decided that, while it is fine to inflict months of cramped suffering for the momentary satisfaction of a McNugget, it is monstrous to allow a few minutes of cock suffering for a film that could potentially bring joy for decades.  As cockfighting is now illegal in every state, unless you are Roy Jones Jr, this film is one of the few ways you might gain exposure to a pastime enjoyed by the likes of Jefferson and Washington.

A woman's place...

6.  Redneck Grade Misogyny. We like to think that social mores are continually being rolled back, but this film would never be permitted today.  Apart from the animal cruelty issues, the nonjudgmental depiction of the treatment of women as livestock would render the script DOA.  Naturally, Frank loses the film’s opening fight, on which he has bet his truck and trailer, to his main rival, Jack (Harry Dean Stanton, also very good).  Frustrated by the loss, Frank angrily throws his unwashed laundry at his lazy woman, before meeting back up with Jack.  Frank pays his debt and, almost as an afterthought, decides to throw in the woman with his other possessions and make a clean break of it.  To be clear, he has not done anything so noble as bet and lose his woman on a cockfight.  Rather, on a whim, he has decided to simply include  the woman for free, along with the stuff he’s actually obligated to hand over, largely because she hasn‘t done the laundry.

We see her twice more.  First, after a rematch between Frank and Jack she runs into the cockring after Frank wins and attempts to attack him for having given her away.  Her new husband scoops her onto his shoulder and the two men dance about and taunt her as she flails hysterically and the crowd laughs and cheers.  We see her a final time when she is sent over to Frank to deliver the line, “Jack says I have to apologize to you.”  Frank magnanimously accepts the apology, but has set his sites on an old flame who he woos by pulling the head off a dead roster and handing it to her.

This was Kurosawa’s first color film, and the master does not appear to have missed a beat when dealing with a new media. Every frame is a riot of color and is beautifully framed from start to finish. If the subtitles were off, one would think this was happy and lighthearted fare. As with Rashomon, he has something rather dark to say about human nature. These are, after all, slums filled with forgotten people, and there are no inspired hobos here spouting off casually wise proverbs. The denizens are poor, lower class day laborers, alcoholics, the mentally beaten, hardworking and broken, or never-working and lazy. Just on the edge of busy streets, such ‘informal settlements’ exist in most every major city in the world, and are meant to be invisible. The crime rates are astronomical and those inhabiting them have learned to live underground, beyond the reach of contemptuous authorities or useless (to them) statistics. Kurosawa spends time with each, weaving stories about them in ways that do justice to their backgrounds without whitewashing their hardships nor exonerating their iniquities.

A mentally retarded man is seen carefully preparing for his day at work. In a masterful show of efficient and silent character development, we watch his mother pray furtively for unspecified favors while the camera slowly pulls back to reveal the tin shack interior to be encased in drawings of trains. He pulls on fictional work gloves and an engineer’s cap, and proceeds to run through the slum streets screaming train noises like “DODES-KA-DEN!”. He is never meant to be a Nobletard^TM, filled with life and simple joys – he is a mentally deficient and intensely annoying person who cannot help his helplessness, and requires food and shelter from his undoubtedly long-suffering mother who runs a snack cart just to keep her and her son in poverty. Each morning she must endure the taunting and clean off the graffiti that mocks her son’s obsession. Few of the characters here live with something resembling dignity.

The other characters are similarly desperate. There are the gossipy women clustered around the water spigot, a man who exploits her browbeaten adopted daughter as a work slave (among other things) while his wife is hospitalized, a manic father living in a rusted car chassis with his son who spends his days imagining his dream mansion with gilded fencing, two drunks who swap wives and drink away what little money their spouses earn, and a man with a murderer’s eyes who lives in quiet hatred in spurning his former lover. There is little sentimentality to spare here, as everyone lives on the edge of ruin. The human psyche can be all too easily bent beyond recognition with the application of sustained pressure, time, and the absence of hope. Through it all, Kurosawa peppers the film with unforgettable images that almost appear disposable. One person regards a dead, twisted tree silhouetted against a crystalline blue sky, saying “It is no longer a tree when it is dead.” The brilliant palette and ephemeral tone almost mock the harsh subject matter as well as any notion of hope. These people are here to stay until they are dead, leaving behind children to follow in their beaten, shuffling footsteps. Some have fallen here after the failure of a marriage or business, but nobody will leave except via burial.

There is a recurrent motif of illusion, which the filmmaker crafts with precision use of distracting color and occasionally surreal imagery. The retarded ‘engineer’ imagines the trains he drives, and the people he serves, and though he is a constant annoyance to the people, what else is he supposed to do with his time? The drunks live an illusion of happiness while they trade women who live an illusion of marital adequacy. The man who utilizes his adopted daughter is laboring under the misapprehension that he runs his household and is a ‘real man’ in the sense of being a provider while doing absolutely nothing to strengthen the house. Finally, the disheveled man and his son, living in the rusted hulk of a car and trying in vain to stay warm while subsisting on food cast into trash bins or the kindness of local butchers. He spends each day detailing the various European styles which their mansion would emulate. Even as the child becomes sick with dysentery, he whiles away the hours with elaborate plans while his son humors his need for illusion. This is understandable, though deeply tragic, insomuch as illusion is all the people of the slum can truly subsist upon. Whether the medium involves sex, alcohol, or religion, fallacy is all there is to lubricate the motions people go through when they have long since given up hope of anything but minimal survival.

Where a lesser filmmaker would make such a subject into a finger-wagging exercise into liberal guilt that is hammered into an entertaining mold, Kurosawa remains the unadorned humanist. As such, he allows the characters to speak for themselves, and the emotional impact of their stories is all the more affecting for it.

Intelligence services for any nation have in common an innate need for secrecy regarding their actions and a defensive posture regarding their activities and justification for same. Any probe of their budgets or actions are generally met with a mixture of contempt and silence, answers to the questions often arriving decades later when the department chiefs are dead or in retirement. This obstinacy could be due to the great importance of state security or to conceal that the value of an intelligence service is way overrated and the aggregate amount of fucking around is about equal to that in the kitchen of a Chicken N’ Waffles. Though tales of CIA ineptitude are legendary (The Fish is Red is a classic of unintentional dark humor, detailing the hilarious attempts to subdue Cuba and kill Castro), it is still assumed that it serves a purpose and is essential to the operations of the U.S. government and protection of American interests overseas. I will accept that notion once proven, but as long as it is safely tucked behind grandiose illusions of ‘national security’, I will safely assume the entire budget ($27 billion in 1998) is blown on cocaine-filled Stratego parties and free crack for the slum dealers. An unfair view, but the comptroller can always issue a rebuttal in the form of an itemized budget.

A similar view is seen in the cold-war classic Our Man in Havana, originally penned by Graham Greene, set in a pre-revolutionary Cuba that was a Disneyland for drugs, brothels, and other business interests that were shy of taxes and scrutiny. Alec Guinness brings a precision ear for sardonic wit as a vacuum cleaner salesman named Wormold with an expensive daughter and a desire to avoid poverty. Business is not good, as he notes to a customer:

“The vacuum runs on electricity, but there hasn’t been much of that since the troubles began.”

“Troubles since when?”

“The death of Queen Victoria.”

He intuits the sun is setting on this particular land of opportunity, and would prefer to get his daughter out of there before she is set upon by greasy men, and get his pale ass back to Herefordshire. Alas, the cash is a bit thin, and there is no likely run on vacuums in the near future. Chance brings Mr. Hawthorne (Noel Coward) into his shop, a man serving king and country in the secret service, hoping to recruit a station chief for Cuba. That station chief will then recruit spies and informers who will in turn recruit their own in a pyramid scheme that sounds just stupid enough to be accurate. That a vacuum cleaner salesman was the first choice is part of the joke, since the only qualification appears to be a job that makes a convincing cover. From there, he need only recruit an army of informers, and submit a bill for expenses to his chief in Blighty. No proof is required, which again sounds idiotic and probably on the money. Since Wormold is more nebbish than cloak-and-dagger, he fails to recruit anyone in a series of scenes that show Guinness has an immaculate gift for comedy, particularly when attempting to proposition a man in the gent’s. His superior is no better, as his identity is so secret, that a police car follows him constantly while his tweed suit and umbrella is a smidge conspicuous.

Frustration builds until he realizes that the pond between London and Havana is famous for being very big, and as Joe Pesci noted, “I don’t know anyone who can see that far.” He proceeds to invent a large cadre of spies too numerous to even remember, and even sketches a series of futuristic super-weapons that somehow resemble vacuum cleaner parts. The office of MI-6 goes pear-shaped over these revelations and sends an accountant and demands proof of these weapons as an attack is given serious consideration. All of this sounds implausible and indigestible as a film, except for two things. One, Alec Guinness is such an affable yet confident actor that he can sell any role or situation – see Kind Hearts and Coronets as but one example. And two, without adequate oversight, one can get away with virtually anything. After all, Wormold is ‘our man in Havana’, so why should he be doubted?

Several films have toyed with the idea that intelligence services are riddled with termites of this kind, creating networks of individuals and bodies of information that only demonstrate the elusive nature of truth and the impracticality of awareness of one’s enemies’ activities, real or imagined. The Tailor of Panama is a virtual remake of Our Man in Havana, and an inferior one at that. Burn After Reading is a deceptively simple take on the same idea, where Havana makes its agenda plain. The Russia House, though not a comedy, masterfully deconstructs the world of “grey men” as ethically and ideologically bankrupt when a Russian physicist offers to give to the West the total Soviet capability for nuclear war, and is ignored because that capability turns out to be shit. Few films can rival the dark comedic elements of Havana, which flirts with potentially disastrous shifts in tone as the network of lies threatens to descend upon Wormold’s head. He sends communiqués regarding nonexistent agents with names based on real people, and so those real people start to suffer for Wormold’s imagination. Finally, he becomes a target for assassination, understandable given his importance in the Caribbean intelligence structure. Despite the quietly mounting body count, it remains a farce throughout, and the joke is on us for assuming the business of gray men is a selfless service to protect us. Perhaps the only thing protected are the jobs of agents and the corporate drones who shuffle them across a game board.

When it comes time to plead the truth, and clear up the entire mess as a mistake, the film proceeds to implode into an even more opaque cloud that sweeps the affair under a no doubt crowded rug. Asses are covered, events ignored, and the perpetrators are hidden by promotion in a way that rings loud and true. The perfection of the denouement is every bit the equal of Kind Hearts and Coronets, a film which shares not only a lead actor, but a savage sense of humor and a cynical view of our idea of justice.

Yeah, buddy, I’ll see your Popeye Doyle and raise you a Rupert Anderson. And here’s a Little Bill Daggett to up the stakes. And then – maybe – you’ll come within a nautical mile of Rev. Frank Scott, to date the most fully realized character in Gene Hackman’s long and storied career, as well as his sexiest. Not being fond of either Christianity or the male persuasion, I would convert to both causes unequivocally if I knew Scott would be there waiting, slyly smiling in that come-hither turtleneck. You know the shirt – that second skin; that thin, ever-so-daring veneer of cotton that stands between us and a pleasure only peril on the high seas can provide. But he’s no ordinary reverend: he believes in an Almighty, yes, but only one that rewards the bold, the strong, and the strapping. “God likes winners,” he tells his flock, and proves it again and again by singlehandedly saving the only survivors worth a damn. But he’s not above shouting at his deity, cursing his name, blaming him for all manner of tragedy, and asking that, at the very least, the old man stand the hell out of the way. Though soiled, burned, and exhausted, he alone knows the way out of madness, yet still manages a self-imposed martyrdom to push his lambs forward for that last, bitter step. He’s a singer, a dancer, a fighter, and a prick. He’s the Jesus of Disaster. The greatest hero from the greatest cinematic decade the world has ever seen.

2. Pamela Sue Martin

All of 19 during the filming of this eternal classic, Ms. Martin (as Susan Shelby) exudes innocent, yet spread-eagle sexuality; gazing longingly at Rev. Scott (we’re with you, sister), yet not so selfish as to deny those mind-boggling gams to the rest of us. She’s brave when she needs to be, but helpless and vulnerable in equal measure, proving that the only real woman in a disaster epic is one who leaves you guessing as to whether she’s a wrong turn from being scalded to death, or simply being fucked in a corridor as the sparks fly. To some, she’s blank femininity personified; a vapid slab of screeching eye candy on board simply to get wet and make eyes. But of the ship’s fairer sex, no other character allows us to care so deeply about an eventual rescue. If this dies, we cry, why on earth should I invest a shred of my future erections? Sure, she doesn’t do much by way of actual heroic intent, but she’s the only real motivation anyone needs. Old Jewish broads can die like dogs, and snippy British porters can take eternal baths in boiling vats, but please, let us have the young and the sexy for the duration. And so we do.

3. Ernest Borgnine

Jesus Christ, Ernie is damn near 100 at this point, and the fucker’s still hard as iron. He’d out-fuck you, out-fuck your younger brother, and still have time for a bare-knuckle bout in the rain. He looks better with his shirt off than just about any other passenger, including the women, likely out of a thick-headed need to be the dumbest and burliest ox in the arena. For proof, check out his Detective Mike Rogo, a fuck-you cop who marries a whore, if only because he’s pumped lead into just about everyone else. He’s mean, bitter, and more sanctimonious than the good reverend, but he’s doing it all for love, though likely the kind that involves a great deal of biting, slapping, and donkey punching. Oh, that Linda; not only a woman who’s fucked so many she defies the odds and meets at least one john during the cruise, but the only thing Rogo’s ever given two shits about. And so she dies. Horribly, and only minutes before rescue. But who could have foreseen her demise when she scaled ladders in high heels? But Rogo’s a loner at heart, and I fully expect him to spend the rest of his days shouting obscenities at Linda’s 5×7 hanging in his unkempt bedroom, hoping she rots in hell in the same instant he fights backs the tears of tragedy.

4. Incest, and Other Love Affairs

Susan’s hard-nipple lust for Rev. Scott notwithstanding, there’s a great deal of love permeating this ship, running from the dull and shopworn (an aging Jew for his linebacker of a wife) to the odd and vaguely exciting, at least when brothers and sisters are involved. Nonnie, she of the silky gams and thousand yard stare, has a thing for her brother, you see, the artfully bearded Teddy, a drummer who may channel a Spinal Tap Harry Shearer, but has enough sex appeal even after death to damn near offer a better alternative for sis than potential rescue. “Did you like his music?” she asks, though she’s much more interested in telling everyone within earshot how she can’t live without him. When alive, she winked and flirted, up close and from afar, not only running her hands though his hair, but talking about a “morning after” in a way only siblings could ever understand. It stands to reason that she moves from her own brother to a man 50 years her senior, but at least he’s Red Buttons. Just as crazy is Rogo’s overbearing tyranny disguised as spousal commitment, exceeded just barely by Rev. Scott’s passionate affair with God, who is both a jealous lover and vicious, exacting lay. As with all long-married couples, Scott and God bicker with intense frustration; a maddening, bile-spewing interchange interrupted, though briefly, by the defiance of a shaking fist.

5. Leslie Nielsen

Before Drebin, there was Harrison. Captain Harrison, if you’re keeping score. Though steering the final voyage of the S.S. Poseidon into a monstrous tidal wave, killing hundreds, Harrison is a captain’s captain nonetheless. Stressed to the breaking point and watching his golden years go the way of the graveyard, he remains ever conscious of his duties and, amidst chaos and impending doom, offers his crew the bon mot, “By the way, Happy New Year.” Within seconds, he’s dead to the world, later to be found as if having been electrocuted, BBQ’d, and set aflame, though only after suffering the indignity of drowning. As helpless as he is – “Oh…my…God..”, he offers, about as worthless as handing over the controls to a child – he holds to his ship with the tenacity of a soldier, reducing a company executive to mincemeat, even if he bends to his will in the end. Full steam ahead, indeed, which begs the question of Harrison’s suicidal impulses. Still, a case can be made that rather than send his beloved mistress of the sea into retirement, it’s better to wreck the fucking thing altogether, destroying the oceanic village in order to save it.

6. God, Sadistic Cocksucker

That ever-loving Creator, Lord of all things, with babies to feed and orphans to house, apparently had nothing better to do on a New Year’s Eve than overturn an ocean liner and kill its inhabitants one by one, all with an unprecedented heartlessness. Most died off-screen, of course, though no less heinously, but he saved his best work for the up close and personal, dispatching his poor creations with an efficiency unseen in the annals of the disaster genre. There’s Linda Rogo, mere yards from fresh air and freedom, rocked off her feet by an unnecessary boiler blast and sent ass over pussy into a cauldron of fire. It’s as if God had to pull one final orgasm from his hat before reluctantly letting a chosen few skate by. It’s no accident that his final victim was a prostitute, preferring, predictably, to spare the two virgins on hand. And why Belle Rosen? Selfless, sassy, and a champion swimmer, she rescued Rev. Scott from a watery grave, yet was rewarded for her troubles with a massive coronary. Fucker wouldn’t even let her get to Israel to meet her grandson for the first time. And then there’s Acres, the wise Brit who knew a way out, yet had to be murdered within minutes by needlessly falling from a ladder. Some say he was pushed. Teddy dies before sharing a bed with his sister. Chaplain John was reduced to shattered powerlessness, twisted and turned into arguing in favor of sheer suicide. Speaking through this holy man, the actual God cackled like a fevered hen. All along he knew more would die because they wouldn’t question a man of the cloth. Why he spared the young boy is open to speculation, but I’m imagining he had far worse in store for him later.

7. The Steam-Filled Suicide Speech

“What more do you want of us? We’ve come all this way, no thanks to you! We did it on our own, no help from you! We didn’t ask you to fight for us! But damn it, don’t fight against us! Leave us alone! How many more sacrifices? How much more blood? How many more lives?! Belle wasn’t enough! Acres wasn’t! Now this girl! You want another life? Then take me! You can make it! Keep going! Rogo! Get them through!” (body falls, cue ejaculate)

Leave it to Bunuel to craft a film depicting lunacy in crystalline form that manages to both indict religion in general, and invite sympathy for the insanely devout. Considering the question of faith and its value, it helps to simplify the environment around the intellectual exercise that will provide the context. History has documented the asceticism of stylites since Saint Simeon stood atop a pillar for 37 years to demonstrate his penance in the 5th century, and it provides the perfect stage upon which the surrealist master can play a little game filled with enough metaphor and unexplained symbolism to make the viewer every bit as much a part of the action as the man on the pillar. And though the scenes progress from odd to incomprehensible, the craft of the filmmaker assures you that a steady hand is on the rudder.

Simon preaches the word of his preferred god from a pedestal in the desert to a devoted following, all of whom are in awe of his adherence to his faith. He performs miracles, and helps his people in that he reinforces their belief system in a way that works for most everyone. Promotion occurs when he reaches the sixth year, sixth month, and sixth day of his occupation of the perch (the significance of the number is lost on everyone) and he is moved to an even higher one provided by a rich benefactor. The increase in distance from his followers, as if he is that much closer to God, appears to push his ridiculous example past a breaking point, and his retinue abandons him. Hilariously, a man who lost both his hands responds to their miraculous restoration by smacking his daughter. And so the rift is made real, between the zealot and the apathetic. Into this divide steps Satan, embodied by the succulent Silvia Pinal (the heroine of Viridiana, bless her) in various guises. Satan attempts to lure Simon down from his pedestal by suggesting that his performance is rather unnecessary. I will not go into details into how this is eventually achieved, except that removal of the austere devotee from his pedestal depends upon removing him from that context, demonstrating that perhaps religion has lost its practical uses with the march of time. The final act (I will not spoil it for you) is open to interpretation, as is all of Bunuel’s work, which thankfully resists easy characterization.

All of Bunuel’s trademarks are here, from unexpected symbolism and disorienting shifts in subject and time, to the fetishism that consumed him. Examination of fetishes works in Bunuel films that deal with religion (The Milky Way, Nazarin), since religions in general, and Christianity in particular, lean heavily upon fetishism. From the iconography to the fussily conducted rituals, and the preoccupation with sexuality, there is a playground in which to play with these ideas. When Satan drives up to Simon’s pillar in a coffin that sounds like a streetcar, only those lacking a sense of humor could resist a laugh. Simon of the Desert is no vitriolic attack upon organized religion – it is a visionary and formidable intellectual mind having some fun. If Christianity appears ridiculous and out of step with practicality and modernity, then such things are collateral damage. Whatever your views, the film provides rich material for discussion, and so remains with you every bit as long as the eye slice of Un Chien Andalou.

If there must be a central theme, it would be the struggle to maintain faith in the face of apathy, long after any practical reason to do so has vanished. His apostles wander off, regarding his sacrifice with contempt, and still he remains on the pedestal. One priest accuses him of fraud, and he is nonplussed. He becomes delirious, blessing crickets and rabbits as a “bit of fun”, but persists in his vigil. Ultimately, it takes Satan to shake him into a new perspective by bringing him down to earth to admire the view. Perhaps in the closing moments, he realizes the futility of faith, and how one’s dignity and humanity are the first casualties of embarking upon a journey of asceticism, denial of earthly pleasures, and pursuing a pure faith. Maybe this is the beginning of wisdom for him, but in a way this could be seen as tragic, as the tremendous inner strength that served him before has now ebbed.

In the interim, Bunuel does not deny his affection for this odd character – he admires Simon’s sincerity and innocence. One monk who provides Simon with food discusses the notion of property and how it fuels human conflict, using Simon’s food bag as an example. “What if I take this, and call it mine?” Simon is puzzled by the concept, and gives it to him without hesitation. A world filled with true believers like him would be utterly at peace. Dull and thoughtless, but peaceful. One cannot really talk to Simon, but one can find something in his ethic to admire, uncomplicated though it might be.

True believers are impossible to communicate with, and are generally felt to be the most dangerous people alive. All the same, they engender a perverse sort of respect from me for at least backing their insane ideas with all their physical and mental strength. Their number in this world is thankfully few, though through the tireless work of charlatans eager to take advantage of the simpleminded, their number is growing daily. And it is this group that poses a greater danger than any fanatic – they do not believe a single word they say, but these sociopaths speak the language of the fanatic, and know how to galvanize them en masse. Half-hearted Christians, after all, form the core of the American right-wing, and despite their extremely vocal piety, they amass wealth through graft, perpetrate fraud, and take advantage of public stupidity to leverage their control over bureaucracy and business. Pat Robertson claims to be just a shade below the stature of Jesus, but that does not stop him from owning a controlling interest in diamond mines in West Africa that utilize child labor.

These parasites view religion as an opportunity to part people from their cash or their power. A true Christian extremist would take a vow of poverty and immerse himself in the worst slums on earth and would survive on bread, faith, and little else. At worst, they may take to the streets and threaten to become the Fist of the Good Lord for any who do not agree with them, but such movements no longer have much momentum in an information age when even idiots know better. Though religion is so widespread and accepted that only 39 percent of Americans believe in evolutionary theory, this can be attributed to those half-hearted acolytes who believe that one can appreciate scientific advances yet adhere to a religion that has fought tooth and nail against everything science has accomplished after the construction of the iron maiden. A true believer would repudiate all that exposes their belief system as bullshit, and so they would be reduced to an ascetic like Simon. Best of all, you would know who they are, and would properly ignore them on their pedestal, as most of his followers did.

The film hearkens from a time when intellectual games were fodder for the screen, and viewers would chatter endlessly about what heresies the next project from Bunuel, Godard, or other mischievous filmmakers would attempt. At a time when films are either indifferently made and aggressively marketed blockbusters or ersatz quirky independent films, the work of geniuses like Bunuel stand out like a column in a desert. Playful and fearlessly inventive, his filmography offers an eclectic buffet of ideas for you to repeatedly gorge upon and vomit heartily. Still, if you appreciate his vision, then make a point of supporting the next auteur who brings an experimental edge to the cinema, or you will continue to entrench the hacks of world cinema.

How a drama about a convicted murderer being released from prison and attempting to find her place in an alien world could be described as ‘light’ is difficult to say. Perhaps it is due to a nuanced sensibility that did not want to nosedive into purple melodrama, or the mostly internal performance by Kristin Scott Thomas. Though a solid enough picture, and one that shuns exposition in favor of revealing background details through actual human conversation and realistic behavior, it does not do much with the search for identity apart from taking a conventional tack in the final reel with a redemptive twist that felt wholly unnecessary. Avoid the last paragraph for spoilers (or not), since I do feel the film is worth a look for the quality of the acting and for the way the particulars of character development are teased out with subtlety.

Thomas plays Juliette, just released from prison after a fifteen year stint, and from the opening shot, she is clad in a haggard mask that appears hardened by solitude and cigarette smoke. Very few words are passed, and what transpired before is hinted about more than expressed, as the screenplay trusts the viewer to keep up. She seems unsettled by her freedom and uncomfortable in any social setting where she is torn between the desire to interact and the deeper desire to be left alone. Her mask barely conceals her mixture of regret, shame, and the need to be understood. Initially, though, her primary expression is confusion at why she was let out in the first place, since her life is over and there is little point in starting over. In these early passages, the disaffection experienced by the previously incarcerated is well done. After her sister picks her up at the airport, even the most basic of conversations highlights the gulf between them:

“I finished my graduate work to get my master’s, and my husband and I moved to this town. That’s life.”

It most certainly is not. Over time, she grows to appreciate her sister’s help and affections, though she initially appears to be cold and distant. Isolation can do that to you, but she was isolated from everything and everyone she knew. “The world went on without me.” Most of these conversations are oblique, as everyone wants to avoid discussing that she was a guest of the state, and what she did to end up there. She has great difficulty speaking to anyone, and wishes to avoid any mention of the past for good reason. In a job interview, she states what that crime was, and she is thrown out immediately.

Eventually this shell cracks, and she is able to relate to her sister (The crack occurs when she assures her sister that ‘inside’ is not a preferable term to ‘prison’). Even this is difficult, as her sister had taken great pains to forget Juliette, and her parents hated her very existence. In one jarring scene, Juliette and her sister visit the nursing home where their English-borne mother is marinating in her dementia. After cursing at them both in French, she abruptly recognizes Juliette and switches to cooing in English, clearly not recalling her crime. This actually does happen to dementia patients. The underlying theme is that one can never go back, and that the past cannot be forgotten no matter how inconvenient or traumatic.

Throughout the film, the progression feels natural, and the character study of Juliette never feels forced or hollow. Kristin Scott Thomas remains luminous throughout, and is pitch-perfect down to the French language with a British lilt to accentuate that she was imprisoned in a British jail. The supporting cast is uniformly excellent, with no extraneous quirks to be found.

Despite the light treatment of the material, the film never really has the chance to soar – the conversations and awkward moments are clipped and edited into short, bite-size segments that do not allow the characters to breathe, as if the director was worried that the audience would become bored. The denouement left a great deal to be desired, as it ties up the moral loose thread that really was better left unfettered. You see, Juliette murdered her six year old son, which would make her a monster in nearly everyone’s eyes. During the film, you learn to sympathize with her and wonder what happened in that dark moment when the human side yielded to other impulses. It may be cliché to suggest that anyone is capable of a heinous act, but the idea remains fresh when allowed to spool out and remain hanging in the breeze.

There it will always remain, and the imagination of the audience can run riot with a blend of imagination and projection in how we would psychologically deal with this sort of a past. Then, in a last tear-filled monologue, Juliette states that her son had symptoms of a neurological disorder and was dying anyway. Her compassionate euthanasia breaks with the film’s prior compartmentalization of moral past and present, and casts the main character as a misunderstood hero who had a rather easy ethical decision after all. Perhaps you will disagree, but I prefer my films in shadow, with poorly demarcated edges. Even so, the film is quite compelling, and Kristin Scott Thomas restates her case as one of the most compelling and insanely hot actresses of our time.

There once was a time, right around the tail end of mankind’s greatest adventure of incalculable butchery, when the sum total of feminine experience could be reduced to a buzzword or textbook quirk. Psychological reductionism wasn’t the half of it — women were simultaneously complex and easily read; a poisonous, unholy mix of venom, rage, self-loathing, and crippling insecurity, usually topped off by a dash of murderous impulse. Cinematic dames have, of course, developed since then, even if the real article hasn’t all that much, and it’s a compelling argument just the same that we’re not the better for it. Sure, the female persuasion can still surprise us now and again – naked, dead, or in need of a good smack to dutifully align the planets – but they’ve never been as interesting as when they, in the words of the classic Leave Her to Heaven, “loved too much.” At once incomprehensibly vague and pointedly honest, it’s a turn of phrase no longer in favor, though one altogether suited to an age. Could someone, as it goes, really love too much? And what would be left in the wake of such an event? If Ellen Berent Harland (Gene Tierney) is any indication, nothing less than murder, attempted murder, a self-induced miscarriage, pitch-perfect frame-up, and blistering suicide. And to think she lost the Oscar to a more subtle Joan Crawford.

That Tierney was a looker from the old school only minimizes her beauty. Here, in sweltering Technicolor, her volcanic mounds of merciless malice, sharpened as if by the devil’s own blade, spell doom for Richard Harland (Cornel Wilde) the moment he catches her eye on a southbound train. She stares as if gripped by the be-all of grand mal seizures, yet it’s not paralysis that brings forth the fixation; she’s sizing up the poor slob for slaughter. The glare is uncomfortable to say the least, but he’s hooked, like a dumb fish unfamiliar with womanhood’s oldest, slickest bait. Who knew that they’d be off to the same New Mexico ranch, but as the decade proved, alternatives were decidedly not for the taking. It’s as fixed as the stars, and it’s enough to await the death knell. Yes, Ellen is the old maxim made flesh: beauty kills, though not with kindness, but the illusion of satisfaction. So seduced, she’ll drain you, defeat you, and pack you away like so much storage. But have you she will, and Richard follows along like a sad, sick puppy. Though locked in a deadly dance without escape, his first, most lasting mistake is the demonstration of joy. This love for, attraction to, or need of anything, large or small, that isn’t her, will only force the clamp down with more authority. Smile in any direction, and she’ll ensure it never happens again.

Richard’s “anything” is not a job, or a house, or even a former lover, but his fanatically upbeat brother, Danny. As you would expect, Danny is afflicted with polio, which means that the special bond between siblings constantly threatens to overtake Ellen’s womanly need to be worshipped. We know where all is tending, of course, and merely wait, helpless as kittens, for the two to be alone, preferably on the water, where aid and comfort is too far to make any difference. Such a body of water soon appears in the form of a lake in wild Maine (an estate wonderfully called Back of the Moon), where Ellen pushes the swimming boy to the brink so that he cramps up and drowns. Ellen’s flimsy effort to save the lad is purely for show, and before long, Danny’s lifeless body is removed, joining Richard’s one true purpose in eternal banishment. Still, the woman’s no hypocrite. Her hatred of youth and possibility also extends to her own womb, where the seed of tomorrow is crushed by a deliberate leap from the stairs. Her fetus is an infection; a nasty, irritating reminder of not only her gender, but the eventual need to express selfless responsibility. She curses the unborn child; screeches its vile name until, suddenly inspired, she removes it, spot-like, as if Lady Macbeth with legs to burn. It’s more than the vanity that abhors the puff and bloat of motherhood; it’s the wholesale rejection of existence itself.

After chalking up a few shoulder-shrugging victims to her credit, Ellen pulls what all cornered vixens eventually push on unsuspecting manhood: the suicide. Out with a bang, indeed, though her final act is to pin it on her sister, Ruth, the one decent sort in this whole mess, though she too just happens to have a thing for Richard. After Richard dedicates a book to Ruth, an act akin to genocide on Ellen’s sliding moral scale, the hysterical harlot ingests poison during a casual picnic, though she’s not spared the usual death bed dramatics. Before swallowing her destiny, however, she writes a jilted lover from the past, a man who just happens to be a district attorney, and exactly the sort to take Ellen’s accusation as gospel. No one ever learns, it seems, though he’s ambitious, and this very case could clinch the governor’s mansion. That he’s Vincent Price should surprise very few, and alarm even fewer, as his verbal dexterity takes a backseat to no one, save perhaps Rufus T. Firefly. The courtroom exchanges are an utter delight, unchallenged in their absurdity, and at the very moment the splatter of words proves too much to bear, a confession emerges to tear the whole thing asunder. Ellen’s quest is thwarted, though even from the grave, we expect her grasp to re-emerge with all the tenacity of a woman scorned.

So as you go about your day and the titans of Hollywood’s golden age fade ever more into that flickering past, salute the likes of Ellen Harland and those who bring them to life. Ms. Harland is dead and gone, like the sanctioned misogyny that produced her, but I defy anyone to equate her extinction with progress. That wonderful siren Ms. Tierney also rots beneath our feet, and who among us could ever hope to fit the bill? Sex continues, as does the female form’s capacity to induce unthinking orgasm, but few and far between are the lips and hips that could have me for a whisper. Or a glance. No one is capable of loving too much in these dreary, homogenized times, it seems, and what’s more, we wouldn’t want them to if they tried. It was a glorious past to be sure, when women had only to nudge, even nod, and we’d throw it all away. Ellen was as daffy as a loon, but she was worth dying for. And the killing, well, that goes without saying.

Maybe it’s the fact that I once fucked a carpet cleaner telemarketing chick who was his doppelganger. Or perhaps it’s the voice like Orson Welles, combined with that unforgettable ginger afro, that does the trick. Even more, it could simply be that he incurred the wrath of Zeus for killing off all the winged horses save Pegasus. Or his obsession with whipping the shit out of, well, everything. Whatever it is, Calibos is the heart, soul, and ravaged-mug center of Clash of the Titans. He’s brutish, deceitful, cruel, and not above sending a giant vulture into a woman’s room to steal her spirit for a night of masturbation. Even after losing a hand to the dreaded Perseus, he dusts himself off and fashions a pitchfork for a new appendage. He’s arguably one of the cinema’s most misunderstood villains, as his punishment – banishment to the marshes and that god-awful skin tone – was hardly deserved for such minor crimes. Zeus, typically self-righteous and sanctimonious despite raping damn near half the lower world’s unsuspecting mortals (usually disguised as an animal, no less) craved vengeance, not justice. Typically, Zeus exempted his own kin, preferring the children of other gods to punish. What is a man cursed to look like a deformed devil to do? And his cry – “Remember me how I was!” – is simply devastating to behold.

2. Bobo

The only thing more surprising than America not being taken by storm with a Bobo toy craze in the early 80’s was Harry Hamlin’s insistence on calling the little bugger “Boo-Boo.” All clicks, chirps, burps, and peeps, his disarming means of communication is a curious combination of a cuckoo clock, R2-D2, and a Jethro Tull flute solo. And who could forget Burgess Meredith’s cry as he first entered the scene: “By the gods! An owl!” No ordinary owl, my good man. He not only lights the trail for Perseus and his band of brave souls, he steals the Eye from the Stygian witches, signals oncoming danger, and isn’t so proud that he can’t trip and fall like a reasonable comic sidekick. He’s cute and cuddly to boot, never more so than when he stretches his mechanical limbs after a good night’s sleep.

3. Medusa

Yet another poor mortal given the shaft by an unreasonable Zeus, the former beauty was shackled with a serpent tail, rattle, and snake-infested weave after being raped by Poseidon in the Temple of Aphrodite. Even then, so many centuries ago, women were blamed for having the audacity to be on the cock end of a sexual assault. At the very least, she was blessed with incredible bow hunting skills. And that rattle! It’s one of the creepiest memories of my early years, especially when it continues to pierce the silence after her beheading. Murdered by Perseus for no good reason, she gamely defended her turf until being tricked into spilling her bloody cocktail sauce throughout her dimly lit chamber. At least she’s given the last laugh by ending the Kraken’s reign of terror, thereby sticking it to that Poseidon cocksucker.

4. Laurence Olivier

As if the Jazz Singer remake wasn’t enough, the world’s greatest thespian couldn’t resist yet another slumming exercise to rid himself of the demons that forced him into dreck like Hamlet and Othello. Giving Zeus every last ounce of his talent, he ignored the ever-present Pink Floyd light show behind his head and managed to make lines like, “You set him down half-naked in a despairing city?”, ring with eternal truth. Or when punishing Calibos: “He will become abhorrent to human sight!” His gusto seemed a bit forced when he yammered to Perseus on the shield, whispering, “Find, and fulfill your destiny,” as if half-awake and fully stoned. And who else could pull clay statues from a wall and shape their destinies in a scale model of an amphitheater, as if playing with childish army men? Sure, it was just a paycheck and likely something he bitched about in his final days, but he never let on during the film. He’s the legend this masterpiece needed to survive the nitwit who played Andromeda.

5. Harry Hamlin

All lips and cleft chin, his cause is nowhere near as compelling as a half-dozen other characters, but I refuse to be the first and only to refuse those pecs their moment in the sun. Oiled, bronzed, and in possession of the decade’s greatest non-Michael Landon head of hair, Hamlin deserved the stardom that followed, even if no one could remember whether or not the lad could actually act. Still, his character is introduced in one of the cinema’s greatest montages, where he ages a full two decades in a matter of seconds. One minute he’s walking naked with his mother, the next he’s standing atop a majestic steed, furiously leaving behind an indifferent sea. And when he’s not pursing his kisser like the male model he longed to be, he fished, sunbathed, and looked altogether fabulous. We believe Andromeda would crave a peek behind the loincloth, and just as strongly, understand why Calibos would fear him so.

6. The Witches

Who needs Macbeth when you have these three lovely ladies; blind, damn near deaf, and sadistic enough to boil passersby in their cauldron of cruelty. Ah, but they also possess the wisdom of the ages, leading Perseus to Medusa’s island home, as well as giving away the Kraken’s Achilles’ Heel. And the eye! It’s all they really have, and when taken away, it reduces them to a screeching, slobbering mob. “Give us back the eye!” one yelps, as if possessed by the wrath of the very gods who mock her plight. Still, no moment tops the one witch who, when contemplating the battle royale between the Kraken and Medusa’s severed, though still-lethal head, cries, “A titan against a titan!” It’s a unique moment of triumph, and one these isolated, attention-starved women desperately need. They make the most of their brief scene, and who doesn’t want to slap the shit out of Perseus when he tosses back the eye, cruelly shouting, “Here, catch!” It’s the only real reason why we root like hell for the giant scorpions.

7. The Kraken

Few things are as priceless as the sea-swept looks of orgasmic awe on Poseidon’s face when he lets loose the Kraken on Zeus’ orders, but the Kraken’s emergence from the ocean comes pretty damn close. As unjustly murdered as Calibos or Medusa, he’s simply following orders, whether that means coming to steal away the world’s most beautiful woman or flooding a once proud city, killing every last inhabitant, including the wretch who set all this shit in motion to begin with by placing Perseus and his mother in a coffin and setting them upon the waves. And why does that dude remain standing amidst rubble, rising waters, and shifting ground, acting as if he’s Joe Cocker having a stroke? No matter, as the Kraken is the epitome of catastrophic efficiency, rising from his lair for but a single purpose. As it’s less about wrath and savagery than a need to please his master, the Kraken remains a tragic figure, doomed to die for the lust of a slow-witted mortal. The Kraken is all muscle and might, while Perseus needs magic helmets, swords, and shields – as well as the intervention of the gods, no less – to so much as wipe his ass.