Howard Hawks was 56 when he made Monkey Business, a comedy about the discovery of a drug that can make one feel young again, starring Cary Grant and Ginger Rogers. Of course absent-minded professor Cary Grant does not discover the drug; it is mixed by a chimpanzee and accidentally put in the water cooler. Grant and Rogers both drink the water with the drug, though it wears off at different times, causing no end of problems with their relationship. Hawks, as usual, shoots everything at eye level and takes it very seriously, as good directors of comedy do. One may or may not find this film funny but it is also very serious in its examination of the perils and advantages of civilization; it is not coincidence that the drug is mixed by an ape and takes one back to a kind of savagery, as Grant leads a bunch of kids dressed as Indians in an attempt to "scalp" his wife's previous boyfriend, a scene weirdly predictive of John Ford's The Searchers (1956), especially since two cast members of Ford's film --Olive Carey and Harry Carey, Jr. -- have small roles in Monkey Business.
Wednesday, June 12, 2019
Monrovia, Indiana and Monkey Business
A couple of days after watching Monrovia, Indiana, which ends in a graveyard, I was at a funeral in New Jersey: Susan's brother-in-law had suddenly died. Frederick Wiseman's documentary ends in a graveyard, with a truck dumping dirt into a grave, and I was already thinking about my mortality. Wiseman turned 88 in 2018, when Monrovia, Indiana was released and one wonders how many more marvelous documentaries he will make. Wiseman's style --no narration or identification of speakers -- is not to everyone's taste but is a very effective means of portraying the places and institutions his films are about, beginning with Titticut Follies in 1967 and including films about everything from ballet companies to state legislatures. In Wiseman's film about Monrovia we see high schoolers, gun shop owners, restaurant workers, lodge members, farmers, et al. going about their business of earning a living and occasionally having a cup of coffee with friends and talking about their medical problems. Wiseman captures the fleeting beauty of the landscape of everyday life, ending his film with long scenes of a funeral and a burial in a graveyard.
Howard Hawks was 56 when he made Monkey Business, a comedy about the discovery of a drug that can make one feel young again, starring Cary Grant and Ginger Rogers. Of course absent-minded professor Cary Grant does not discover the drug; it is mixed by a chimpanzee and accidentally put in the water cooler. Grant and Rogers both drink the water with the drug, though it wears off at different times, causing no end of problems with their relationship. Hawks, as usual, shoots everything at eye level and takes it very seriously, as good directors of comedy do. One may or may not find this film funny but it is also very serious in its examination of the perils and advantages of civilization; it is not coincidence that the drug is mixed by an ape and takes one back to a kind of savagery, as Grant leads a bunch of kids dressed as Indians in an attempt to "scalp" his wife's previous boyfriend, a scene weirdly predictive of John Ford's The Searchers (1956), especially since two cast members of Ford's film --Olive Carey and Harry Carey, Jr. -- have small roles in Monkey Business.
Howard Hawks was 56 when he made Monkey Business, a comedy about the discovery of a drug that can make one feel young again, starring Cary Grant and Ginger Rogers. Of course absent-minded professor Cary Grant does not discover the drug; it is mixed by a chimpanzee and accidentally put in the water cooler. Grant and Rogers both drink the water with the drug, though it wears off at different times, causing no end of problems with their relationship. Hawks, as usual, shoots everything at eye level and takes it very seriously, as good directors of comedy do. One may or may not find this film funny but it is also very serious in its examination of the perils and advantages of civilization; it is not coincidence that the drug is mixed by an ape and takes one back to a kind of savagery, as Grant leads a bunch of kids dressed as Indians in an attempt to "scalp" his wife's previous boyfriend, a scene weirdly predictive of John Ford's The Searchers (1956), especially since two cast members of Ford's film --Olive Carey and Harry Carey, Jr. -- have small roles in Monkey Business.
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