Unpublished Playboy interview with Stanley Kubrick/Bernard Knowles.
Interview by Anonymous.
Early in 1968, Playboy magazine contacted me about the possibility of interviewing Stanley Kubrick. It was an offer I eagerly accepted. 2001: A Space Odyssey had just opened, and critics, whether they loved the film or hated it, were united on one point: nothing like it had ever been see on a movie screen before.
But was that really true?
What about Harold Lloyd’s character in Never Weaken (who is mildly criminal, suicidal, and cowardly) makes him a silent comedy hero? While he doesn’t evoke the sympathy felt for Chaplin’s tramp, or demonstrate the amazing athletic abilities of a stone faced Keaton, Lloyd still possesses the one quality that a silent comedian must have if he’s to become a hero: he challenges the status quo in some way (even if it’s inadvertently, completely by mistake) and upsets the apple cart of daily routine. Make no mistake about it. Never Weaken isn’t about anything but being funny. It has a single, burning question at it’s center: how many jokes can be crammed into a single 40 minute film? Still, like all good silent comedies, Never Weaken can’t help but also reveal a world of unlimited possibilities, surprises, and laughter.
Plot:Frustrated insurance salesman Clarence Hilliard (played by Timothy Carey, who also wrote and directed) writes a Nietzche-esque pamphlet that claims, “all men are gods,” and then forms a rock ‘n roll band to help push his agenda. Not long after this, politics beckon, and Clarence ditches his guitar and makes a run for the presidency.
If you’re expecting government cover-ups, ETs, implants, and alien hybrids–you know, X-Files kind of stuff–this might not be the movie for you.
Harold Lloyd’s two-reeler High And Dizzy is definitely a *hight* point in silent drunken antics. The drunk routine is like a virtuoso piece of music. The notes never change. It’s all about the performance. Complicated, but clean and direct. Difficult, but appearing effortless. The drunk has three emotional gears he can shift between. Happy camaraderie, confusion, and belligerence. There’s more than enough to provide variety and pacing for a two-reeler.
In the mid fifties, a Civil Defense short was created to address what can only be called The Tidiness Gap. Since the film was intended for the outlying suburbs and towns not immediately in the kill zone of a ground zero explosion, the whole issue of large metropolitan areas being vaporized is discretely sidestepped. The short also tends to focus on the atomic heat or “thermal wave” from a nuclear explosion, and doesn’t have a great deal to offer on the other affects from the blast like… well, for one thing, radiation.
All these years later, it comes as something of a surprise to realize that Hazel might have been our first line of defense against nuclear attack. Perhaps the Civil Defense seal should have been replaced by The Good Housekeeping Seal of Approval.
The first few minutes of 10,000 BC boldly establishes two main themes: people walking — and really stupid dialogue. The challenge of trying to review a film like 10,000 BC or even talk about it, is that you almost immediately begin making obvious comparisons with better movies and trite observations about how trite the plot line is and the next thing you know (just like the movie) nobody’s listening and you’re going blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
Darkness. Flare of acetylene torch — revealing a man sitting on the floor, wedged in between two pieces of bulky equipment. The headgear he is wearing has been ripped open, revealing his face, a single stream of blood trickling down his forehead. He waits in the darkness, the only light the glare from the torch. [...]
Blood Freak isn’t for everyone, but the next time Thanksgiving rolls around, try popping it in the DVD player. After watching the film, you might find yourself experiencing a surprising level of empathy with the turkey cooking in the oven, and if nothing else, Blood Freak might drive away a few unwanted relatives.
Jim Rutherford
Nancy Louise Rutherford
Lou Aguilar
The Misfits
