‘The Wizard of Lies’, is a sad and dreary account of how karma pays back almost instantly in this case where a stinking rich man is left to rot in a prison cell, while his family and the people who invested in his firm, are destroyed in the outside world.
‘The Wizard of Lies’, a Barry Levinson’s TV movie, set around financial crimes amidst economic crisis, engages you for the most part with the ever cryptic Robert De Niro, keeps you guessing till the last frame. Understandably, portraying a character of a man who made a few billions by cheating people a lot more than that, he keeps his cards to his chest. In all the scenes where is with someone he has to be on guard like the scenes with the lady who interviews him in the prison, or the scene where he is desperate to raise a few hundred million in a party, or the scene towards to the end in the prison, where his calls go unanswered, and he is all alone…Robert De Niro does not flinch from the character.
At the same time his enacting throws many questions back to us…as to how does it could have felt like to make money at other’s expense, build a phoney world and when all that…that huge edifice starts crumbling, he is left for gasping beneath it. We get a taste (just a taste) of the vintage (and obsessive) De Niro, in two scenes—one with the waiter about a dirty plate (like the berries scene in ‘Casino’) and soon after insisting his son to sample the lobster above everything else. Infact, one can spot a few similarities between ‘Casino’ and this movie. In the former, he ends up where he started and here, the prison, he should have ended up with.
This movie is a good watch for anyone who is a fan of Robert De Niro and don’t mind a bit of financial mumbo jumbo.
“The Taking of Pelham 1-2-3” (1974) based on John Godey’s eponymous novel is classic story telling at its best with no unnecessary frills or flashbacks or jump-cuts in narration. Just make sure there is a novel idea and get right into it…is the mantra. Throw in a few good actors into the mix, do your best with other departments (like the near perfect low light photography) and tell the story. It’s a bit like a routine subway ride where you know the start and end points and buckle yourself in and enjoy the ride, even if it were bumpy.
Speaking of
subway rides and novelty, what if a subway train were hijacked and its
passengers held hostage? This premise (back in 70s) makes sure there are enough
bumps in the ride and the plot gets the required fillip. And, the film moves so
effortlessly forward, with the bad guys appearing in the first few frames and
then the reluctant good guy who ushers us into the new world of trains and
control rooms. The tour of Japanese visitors in the control room is a terrific
ploy to balance the act of show and tell and also to give the audience the feeling
of an exclusive sneak peek into the new world.
There is something about a laid back protagonist who is slowly sucked into action, and who else can play it to perfection than Walter Matthau. He is probably one of the very few actors, who without changing his physical appearance much (except may be in his later films like ‘I.Q.’ and ‘Dennis the menace’) delivers his usual understated yet effective performance. And this movie is no exception.
Apart from
the racial and gender based remarks/slurs (which might be considered okay
during the time the movie was made, and the nature of the characters) and the
less complicated denouement of the plot, the movie still holds interest even
today. The script has the right kind of elements in place and fleshes out
enough details about each character and you remember each one of them when the
movie is over.
Every now
and then, watching movies like these, reminds us that great movies are about
good stories and great story telling. The journey from good to great begins
with a genuinely novel idea and when it does, the train ride from paper/e-paper
to the screen is guaranteed and so are the bumps (plot points) and the
nosy/adorable passengers (characters). Most importantly, audience feel that they
have an exclusive access into the happenings and thus immersed in the magic of
cinema.
Childhood
defines what we are in many ways. In psychology, there is the talk of repressed
desires or deep desires that are not fulfilled, that actually push us to
project our ego in huge dimensions on to the real world. ‘Citizen Kane’
explores this to great effect and the term ‘Rosebud’ is like a term for
something one loses in her childhood and does everything possible to reclaim it
but can never attain. The same motif of the protagonist losing something in
childhood and trying to reclaim it or making amends for the loss, is oft seen
in many movies and TV shows. Sometimes it’s like the longing for home
(child-like destination of a safe and secure ambience far from the war-cries,
blood and gore), like Maximus in the movie ‘Gladiator’ or the wresting the power
from individuals who once erred you, and become powerful in the process like
‘The Godfather’. So in short, whether it is revenge or homecoming or helping
others or destroying a world or coming of age or self-discovery…whichever
aspect you take it all leads something happened when you were a child or young.
And no matter how much world appears to have been stacked against you or one
thinks it is the world that changed him, it is one’s inner ego that is tortured
that shapes his journey. In this manner
of speaking every journey is inwards, like Joseph Campbell says.
‘Save the tiger’ is about saving the self of Harry Stoner, a successful businessman who has everything till yesterday and now struggles with nightmares of losing it all. And when someone digs into the well of horrors, he sure finds his lost dreams from childhood, tucked deep in the trappings of his exterior world. So begins the journey of Harry Stoner (with a nightmare shaking him up in sweats just like Mr.Campbell wants it) into his deep recesses of his mind and soul, and his desperate attempts to save his business. As often happens in any good story/script, the inner and external journeys juxtapose which each other and so does the motive for his actions. For instance, while he is nonchalant about fixing up his client with a high end prostitute, and employing a professional arsonist to scrounge the insurance money, we get to see his motivation of doing such things.
Harry Stoner was Cuban Pete, an immigrant who wanted American dream and got it. And there is no way he could lose it now. Especially, not in the dreary middle age…where one is sized up first and then his resume read. There are beautiful dialogues about what’s important to him..”wanted to meet a payroll, instead of a pay-cheque” and ‘..god dammit, I live the American dream, don’t try to sell it to me.”
In a way the
movie is about the road to damnation, if one could call it that way. Every
reveal of plot and his character, makes you feel sorry for him, yet one gets to
guess the real end, just like in a good tragedy film. Real tragedy is not death
but lack of redemption. Harry Stoner knows it all along and so do we. There is
no saving an extinct species, and definitely not this tiger. But life moves on
and Cuban Pete survives to see another day, even if his young dreams of playing
basket ball or a being in a band or asking that girl out…or next to
impossible now.
Casting Jack Lemmon is a master stroke. Many have seen his comic antics and in this film he doesn’t anything different, an actor is an actor whether he is in a comic role or in a serious role. He is still his sublime self, giving a performance drawing from his own insecurities and success. But the script allows shining his motive in several scenes. For instance, in one poignant scene, his character breaks down after a neck message (like the one in ‘The Odd Couple’ which had a different effect) tearing his words through eyes..”if only, I had one dream…”. He truly deserved the Oscar for his performance.
‘Save the Tiger’ is a must watch for anyone who would like to see real characters or if you are a writer, make you characters real and their journeys appealing. In life there is no happy ending, only an irony or tragedy. But the legacy lives on, beyond one’s death, physical or metaphorical.
Tailpiece:
My father attempted a small and sweet short story based on a childhood missed dream, and used humour to good effect. ‘Sweet Nonsense’, it was called and link below.
