The Bootblack Stand
Plunkitt, George Washington
"The Bootblack Stand" The other side of the coin, the world of temptation, is just as heavy-handed. When a man bumps into Theresa on the bus, the magazine he's reading is Hustler (Penthouse wouldn't have been enough, we...
...He is self-centered, arrogant, two-timing, and cruel...
...Cordially, Paul Moore, Jr...
...Their style combines a tight-knit pacing in the best Old-Hollywood tradition with a careful attention to character...
...However, I am more concerned with the state of personal liberty amongst the Huns, specifically the repression of Irmgard Moller, the 30-year-old chinless beauty whose attempted suicide at Stammheim prison was thwarted by the German authorities' refusal to give her a sharp butter knife...
...How soon we forget...
...Complementing her is Vanessa Redgrave, superbly understated as the magnetic Julia, the rich girl who sends for Hellman to smuggle money to her in Berlin where she is resisting the Hitler regime...
...George Washington Plunkitt, our prize-winning political analyst, has accepted a staff position with the House Ethics Committee, but he has graciously consented to continue advising American statesmen in these times of trouble...
...Her effectiveness is no small feat in light of thefact that she looks about as much like Lillian Hellman as I do...
...In the case of one of her lovers, it's hard even to conceive of the guy walking upright...
...Julia is another glossy picture, but an accomplished professionalism makes it a moving story of lost friendships...
...Dear Dr...
...The scenes between Hellman and Hammett are intriguing glimpses into a well-known, long-standing affair...
...How they do miss Congressperson Abzug...
...What is so satisfying about Julia is that it succeeds in maintaining the sharp emotional focus of a short story...
...Bishop Episcopal Diocese of New York Dear Bishop Moore: Admirably put, and it surprises me that Congress has not taken action...
...The people in the film are developed in graceful, economical ways and the portrayals are all vivid...
...Without much of a core of empathy, Goodbar becomes an oppressive two-hour procession of nastiness, never real enough to become anything but glossy sensationalism...
...Considering that she literally brings all these semi-humans upon herself, there seems little reason to care about Theresa, even when she is played by an actress as appealing as Diane Keaton...
...These sequences are incorporated into the Julia story from other Hellman memoirs and they enrich the picture of the personal life of this controversial woman...
...The treacherous, savage, and senseless raid by German commandos on the Lufthansa jetliner is a chilling reminder of things about the German past I would rather forget, except that they keep cropping up in the American present...
...THE BOOTBLACK STAND Dr...
...It manages to be both obvious and confused...
...Through the entire service not one prayer was offered up for the Palestinians...
...It is hard to fathom what makes Theresa take up this desperate life...
...Her first love is a college professor...
...But then there was the chilling scene at the Frankfurt airportwhere the so-called hostages landed and took part in a memorial service for the Lufthansa pilot, whose death we so glibly assign to the Palestinian freedom fighters...
...When a man bumps into Theresa on the bus, the magazine he's reading is Hustler (Penthouse wouldn't have been enough, we might have missed the point), and when Theresa walks down a street at night, both sides are always glittering with neon-lit sex shops...
...He is capable of saying much with very little, hinting at a depth of feeling behind the great detective writer's sardonic humor that is all the more affecting for never being explicitly defined...
...As with Goodbar, Julia is a translation from print to screen...
...She projects both the strength and vulnerability of a woman realizing precarious professional ambitions while pursuing a personal life that is no less uncertain...
...A scar at the base of her back does not seem to warrant her sleeping with every lower form of manhood...
...Plunkitt: I write at a moment of anguish for me and decent people everywhere...
...I say let us call the UN Security Council together and see to it that there are sharp butter knives available to the terrorists of Stammheim who aspire to them...
...Address all correspondence to The Bootblack Stand c/o The American Spectator...
...GWP 22 The American Spectator December 1977...
...The movie weaves together Hellman's struggle for literary success, her relationship with Dashiell Hammett, and her friendship with the title character that spans from childhood to a tense reunion in Nazi Germany...
...Screenwriter Alvin Sargent and director Fred Zinnemann string these parts into a fluid narrative line...
...The makers of this film were faced with the problem of converting Lillian Hellman's poignant fifty-page sketch into a full-length feature, running the risk of overextending the content and losing its effect...
...For all this simplification, the movie is in no way lucid...
...Like the rest of the film, this relationship is played with perception and mature compassion...
...Wouldn't it be moving if the American Congress were to proclaim a day of mourning for the deceased—all deceased, even the pilot...
...With such hysterical exercises as Goodbar on the loose, thoughtful filmmaking like this is a refreshing respite...
...What are your suggestions...
...Perhaps the best performance in the movie is Jason Robards' in the role of Dashiell Hammett...
...From there it is all downhill...
...The saddest aspects of the incident, of course, were the storming of the plane, the killing of the plane's peaceful demonstrators, and the brave yet curious suicides of the Stuttgart prisoners...
...As Hellman, Jane Fonda gives an engaging, fully rounded performance...
Vol. 11 • December 1977 • No. 2
