A Major Work

EdgarST

score 10/10

I once met movie people who were very popular at the time ... Sonia Braga, Richard Gere, Amparo Grisales, Klaus Maria Brandauer, Dominique Sanda, Nikita Mikhalkov, Robert De Niro, Christopher Walken, Treat Williams... However, I never asked them for an interview. I learnt my lesson well when I did with a star (Julie Christie), and the woman kept smiling and repeating "What for, what for?" So I preferred to make friends with those I liked ... Ninón Sevilla, Jorge Rivero, Daisy Granados, Fabio Barreto, Ofelia Medina, Gastón Pauls and other gentle artists.

With Harry Dean Stanton I did not develop a friendship. After sending him the magazine with his interview, I gave the paper in which he wrote down his name, address and telephone number to an autograph collector who had a bookstore in Panama called Argosy, as in «Vertigo». However, meeting Stanton in 1984 was a great experience: the interview became normal conversation and he ended up asking me questions. Not only my sincere admiration for his work made him trust, but I also talked about movies that nobody remembered as Monte Hellman's «Cockfighter», or cult films like «Repo Man». I also praised the dignity of his character in a brief scene in «The Rose» and we even talked about the evident class differences in the spaceship Nostromo, in which he and Yaphet Kotto represented the working class in «Alien». At that time, he was at the top, with the success of «Paris, Texas» in the Rio de Janeiro International Film Festival. I have the memory of one of those quality people who are always a pleasure to meet for their calm way of assuming notoriety.

I could not help making this preamble, right after watching «Lucky», the last film Harry Dean Stanton made before he died at age 91 (another movie was released in 2018, but it was shot before). In it, he plays the title role, a nonagenarian war veteran who lives in a village (a mixture of locations in California and Arizona), with a daily routine of yoga exercises, solving crosswords, watching television contests and regular visits to key business (cafeteria, mini-market, bar), and a strange dream every now and then. Until one day when, in perfect health, Lucky collapses and so begins his small journey towards the full awareness of his finitude, his old age and his options.

As in «Gerontophilia», those who best capture the integral dimension of the character and the crisis he faces are we, the old people. We are the invisible kind for the young (a season we all spend at some time), beings that would better do as the Japanese old woman in «The Ballad of Narayama»: pack a little bag and go up the mountain to die of cold. Only sharp young persons will also realize that Lucky is quite clear about the whole scenario. In a crucial scene in the village bar, Lucky finally reveals himself as a sensitive being that, if we had previously thought that he believed not even in his shadow, does have a simple and praiseworthy way to face life and the existence of Humanity.

There are really moving moments in the film, like those in which Stanton plays harmonica tunes; or the sudden moment, on the birthday of the youngest son of his Mexican friend Bibi, when Lucky begins to sing «Volver, volver» in Spanish. There is also a suggestion of well-kept secrets, such as Lucky's sexual orientation, when he reveals a curious fascination for Liberace. The effectiveness of each moment in the film rests on the performances of a cast of first order that includes Ed Begley Jr., Tom Skerritt, David Lynch, Yvonne Huff Lee and former teen idol James Darren.

The film, a first work by actor John Carroll Lynch, went unnoticed in North America, as expected. If you have the opportunity to see it by any means, do not do the same. Enjoy it.

EdgarST 29 December 2018

Reprint: https://www.imdb.com/review/rw4543101/