The Organizer (1963)

Prolific filmmaker Mario Monicelli’s 1963 masterpiece I Compagni, or The Organizer tells the story of textile mill workers in late-nineteenth century Torino who find the strength to protest working conditions thanks to the intervention of an itinerant, mild-mannered (and of course, bespectacled) intellectual vividly realized by Marcello Mastroianni. It’s a thoughtful and beautiful movie, as insightful as you might expect and funnier than the subject matter would suggest. Who’s to say whether or not The Organizer has been forgotten — though it is undeniably rare: only 420 IMDb votes, and not one professional review (though IMDb does link to a superior long essay on the film by the wonderful Marilyn Ferdinand, here). It’s a shame, this is a film certain to please a broad constituency, whether fans of the principals, the Oscars (Best Original Screenplay nominee, 1965), foreign fare, labor movies, or merely great cinematography. It’s a serious film about a serious subject, and like real life itself, it moves smoothly (or awkwardly — depending on your point of view) from tragedy to comedy, brimming with the sort of humanity and struggle that transcends language. This is one of Mastroianni’s most subtle performances, and possibly his best. He punctuates his meekness and restraint with moments of pure charisma and wild abandon, and creates something very memorable.

One note: the poster depicted here is a stinker — Matroianni sports a beard and glasses throughout, and The Organizer is hardly a sexual film, as the poster suggests. 

I’m want to keep my thoughts here very brief, but I did find one sequence in particular to be emblematic of the character of the entire film, demonstrating the novel way in which The Organizer manages to heartbreaking, funny, and endearing all at the same time. Monicelli’s deft blending of irony, humor, and tragedy coalesce perfectly in this sequence, involving a Sicilian, Salvatore Mustafah, who informs the strike committee that he intends to cross the picket line. “What are you?” the committee members ask from their second-story balcony. “A desperate man,” he shouts up from the dirt piazza below. Owing to his recent arrival in Torino, Salvatore is unable to secure a line of credit at the company store and consequently must work. However he doesn’t want to be disrespectful to the strikers so he respectfully informs them of his intentions. Their response is to beat some sense into him, but when they arrive at the little man’s place and quite literally knock the “door” down, they are so appalled by his meager living conditions that they immediately relent and grant him permission to return to the mill. He does so, but the bosses rebuff him and try to toss him back out onto the street, even going so far as to strike him. The enraged little Sicilian then whips out his switchblade (the one filmdom has taught us all Sicilians have at the ready), but alas, it won’t open. In one of the movie’s funniest moments, Salvatore throws the knife to the floor and stomps on it until the catch finally disengages and the blade pops free. But by then, he’s standing alone and the guards are on their way. Monicelli makes the moment intentionally funny, and we laugh whole-heartedly — until moments later when we see Salvatore frog-marched out of the mill in handcuffs, bound for jail and robbed of what little dignity he had left, and we realize that the poorest of the poor always gets the short end of the stick, and that the man with the greatest need, who risks the most, often fares the worst — and that we are laughing at him. But in the end the film is full of such moments, and we understand that Monicelli is neither manipulating us nor is he being cruel. He’s merely reminding his audience that there are times in life where we have to find the humor in the bleakest of situations, lest we give into despair.

The Organizer is very hard to find, but it will reward those who know how to look. 

The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz (1974)

Richard Dreyfuss hustles his way through The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz, a 1974 period film based on the novel by Mordecai Richler. The young actor, a commodity at the time and a year away from going incandescent thanks to Spielberg and Jaws, is fine as the title character, a jewish kid from Montreal who has dreams of a better future than the one facing him, either supervising workers in his uncle’s garment factory, or driving a cab like his father, played by Jack Warden.

Dreyfuss’s talent is obvious from start to finish, and the role requires a fair amount of range. As the film opens, Duddy is still a good-for-nothing-student at a military school. We follow the events of his life over the course of the next year or so, as he leaves school and begins to make connections waiting tables and schlepping bags at a summer resort. Kravitz has lots of ideas but no direction, complaining early on that he missed out on a windfall when he learned that someone else had already though up Kleenex. He finds the goal he needs when his summer crush, Yvette (Micheline Lanctôt) takes him to a nearby lake and tells him it can be had for a song. Kravitz is entranced by the vistas, and sees the surrounding real estate as his way to make his mark on the world; he begins the arduous task of trying to raise the funds to buy the property, which encompasses the rest of the film.

Most of the reels are concerned with the wheeling and dealing Kravitz goes through to make a buck, from waiting tables and making films, to selling pinball machines and driving a cab. At one point he unwittingly becomes a mule, shuttling heroin across the border and into Manhattan on behalf of the local Jewish gangster. As the film progresses and Kravitz’s need becomes more desperate he responds in kind, making a quick progression from begging and borrowing to swindling and stealing, even from those he loves. Randy Quaid, of all people, finds his way into the film as a dim witted bumpkin Duddy befriends and then takes advantage of in half a dozen different ways. Quaid is an epileptic, and the movie takes a downward emotional turn when he crashes a truck hauling Duddy’s junk from one joint to the next.

The picture’s best sequence features Denholm Elliot, a down and out filmmaker Duddy befriends after a night-school lecture. Duddy dreams up a scheme where they’ll produce Bar Mitzvah and wedding movies — “in color!” — but Elliot’s character insists on maintaining his artistic integrity. Their first project is shown in its entirety as a movie-within-a-movie and makes the whole thing worth watching. It’s a scream — really, you’ll scream — and it’ll forever change the way you think of Bar Mitzvahs and bris.

By the end of the film, we’ve witnessed a fairly original version of an age-old movie story: that of the man who fulfills his ambition, but at a terrible price. There are a few problems, particularly over length, as numerous subplots grab screen time and drain vitality from the film. Mostly they paint a picture of Jewish life in the Montreal of the fifties, but the cost is too much: such films work best in the 90-100 minute range, the extra twenty here are nearly a deal-breaker. This has never been released on home video, but is currently available to watch instantly from Netflix.

The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz (1974)
Directed by Ted Kotcheff
Starring Richard Dreyfuss, Jack Warden, Randy Quaid, and Micheline Lanctôt
Released by Canadian Film Dev. Corp.
Running time: 121 minutes.
Availability: Netflix Streaming

That Man from Rio (1964)

Off-beat French film mega-star Jean-Paul Belmondo stars in the zippy adventure spoof That Man from Rio, a humorous riff on spy thrillers, Hitchcock, and edge-of-your-seat Saturday afternoon serials. Belmondo is certainly talented — this film (as well as his monumental filmography) provides particular proof — but he has always baffled (and impressed!) me as a film star. No matter what the role Belmondo always seems miscast. Be it Breathless, Le Doulos, Is Paris Burning?, or whatever, Belmondo just doesn't seem to quite fit in. Yet maybe that's why he makes such a strong impression: he forces you to justify his presence in each of his films, and possibly this owes to his boy-next-door quality: Belmondo always appears to be in just a little over his head, and slightly baffled by what's happening around him. If Bogart always appeared to be one step ahead of everyone else in his films, Belmondo appears to be a step behind — to the benefit of himself and everyone watching.

That Man from Rio finds Belmondo as Adrien Dufourquet, a member of the French air force set to enjoy a weekend pass in Paris with his girlfriend Agnes (Françoise Dorléac). Before Adrien can even get settled, Agnes is kidnapped and spirited to Orly airport, where she is drugged and loaded onto a flight for Brazil. Adrien pursues, and the first of the films many chase scenes unfolds. That Man never stops moving, as one pursuit sequence seems to fold into the next, as the movie sprints from Europe to South America and then back again. Planes, trains, automobiles, motorcyles, boats, and jungles vines — this one puts everything to use.

The film owes a great deal to Alfred Hitchcock, and this is as much an homage as it is a spoof. Philippe de Broca deftly manages to evoke the same feeling — that particularly difficult to pull off melding of action and light comedy that somehow doesn't offend one's intelligence. Others have mentioned the James Bond connection, which given the production year of 1964 makes for a natural assumption, though That Man from Rio has a great deal more in common with North by Northwest than it does with Thunderball (despite sharing a cast member in Adolfo Celi). The film posters push the association as well. The one below is clearly designed to appeal to Bond fans, while the poster above more accurately represents the vibe of the movie — and dig that cool sixties style. Belmondo is clearly channelling his best Cary Grant, while Georges Delerue's music is positively Herrmann-esque.

If Hitchcock and Bond have anything in common, it's the presence of a MacGuffin — and That Man from Rio has one too. In this case it's a set of three Amazonian statues that lead somehow to a hidden cache diamonds leftover by the fictional Maltec civilization. Everyone is after the statues, yet the identity of the film's bad guy is its most closely-kept secret. Instead, Adrien spend most of the running time either running to or away from the criminal mastermind's native goons — all of whom sport poison dart-firing pistols and seem to be made of something stronger than steel — in an effort to retrieve the pale-beauty Agnes.

That Man from Rio is a fun ride, albeit a difficult one to find. It's a movie lovers' delight, referencing everything from silent Harold Lloyd to Hitchcock, and even anticipating the adventure films of the following generation. By the end, viewers are certain to feel as if they've left Hitchcock behind in favor of Indiana Jones. Lawrence Kasden and Steven Spielberg certainly saw this before Raiders of the Lost Ark — and just as Temple of Doom is best forgotten, I won't even mention Sir Winston, Belmondo's delightful little sidekick.

That Man from Rio (1964)

Director: Philippe de Broca

Starring: Jean-Paul Belmondo and Françoise Dorléac

Released by United Artists

Running Time: 110 minutes
Availability: Difficult. Foreign DVD.