Jason Lives: Friday the 13th Part VI (1986)

Directed by Tom McLoughlin
Screenplay by Tom McLoughlin
Produced by Don Behrns
Cinematography by Jon Kranhouse
Music by Harry Manfredini

Key Cast:
Thom Mathews as Tommy Jarvis
Jennifer Cooke as Megan Garris
David Kagen as Sheriff Michael Garris
Renée Jones as Sissy Baker
Kerry Noonan as Paula
Darcy DeMoss as Nikki
Tom Fridley as Cort
C.J. Graham as Jason Voorhees

Genre:  Horror/Thriller/Slasher/Comedy
Rated:  R (edited after receiving an X on first submission)
Runtime: 1 hr 26 min
Country:  USA
Working Title: Aladdin Sane
Budget:  $3,000,000
Gross: $18,964,000 (1996)
Opening Weekend:  $6,751,000
Released: August 1, 1986 
Filmed:  March - April 1986
Aspect Ratio: 1.85 : 1 

Taglines:  ... Nothing This Evil Ever Dies / Kill Or Be Killed 

"Don't I already have two of these?"

Plot:

A thunderstorm is brewing over the little town of Forest Green.

Superhuman serial killer Jason Voorhees has been dead and buried for six years. However, Tommy Jarvis, who killed Jason in self-defense when he was 12 years old, is still haunted by his encounter, resulting in his having been institutionalized for an extended period of time.

Intent on cremating Jason's body to rid himself of his demons, Tommy escapes the mental hospital with his friend, Hawes, and breaks into the cemetery containing Jason's grave. He and Hawes exhume Jason's casket, but before they can cremate the body, an infuriated Tommy begins stabbing it with a steel fence post. The post acts as a conductor for an ongoing lightning storm, and Jason is resurrected from the dead. He kills Hawes with a punch through the heart and throws his body into the exhumed coffin, prompting Tommy to flee the cemetery.

Tommy returns to the town of Crystal Lake, the site of Jason's killings, which has now been renamed Forest Green to distance itself from negative publicity. Tommy attempts to warn the town arrogant sheriff, Mike Garris, of Jason's return, but Garris, aware of Tommy's institutionalization, writes him off as disturbed and has him locked in a holding cell.

Meanwhile, Jason begins a trek back to the lake that was the site of his drowning as a child. En route, he encounters Lizabeth and Darren, a pair of summer camp supervisors, who are themselves headed to the lake to supervise the re-opening of the summer camp. Jason attacks and kills them, leaving their bodies in the woods.

The next morning, Sheriff Garris's daughter, Megan, who is slated to be one of the camp counselors, arrives with her fellow counselors Cort, Sissy, and Paula to report Lizabeth and Darren missing. Tommy cites their disappearance as evidence of Jason's return, but is met with hostility from everyone but Megan, who takes a liking to him. Sheriff Garris sends the counselors off to the campsite and then escorts Tommy out of town; en route, Tommy flees to the cemetery to try and show Garris the open grave, only to discover that the groundskeeper, fearful of being implicated for digging up the grave due to his alcoholism, has covered the grave (and, consequently, Hawes's body) with dirt. Garris handcuffs Tommy and takes him to the city limits, warning him not to return.

Meanwhile, a quintet of business people playing paintball in the woods are set upon by Jason, who kills them and steals their supplies. That night, Jason continues making his way back to Crystal Lake, in the process killing the grave digger and a nearby couple having a picnic. Cort meets up with a local girl, Nikki, and leaves the camp to have sex with her in the woods; they end up in Jason's path and are both killed by him.

"I swear, it wasn't me."

Sheriff Garris ultimately finds the bodies, and believes that Tommy has killed them, living out a delusion of Jason's return.

Tommy, meanwhile, has contacted Megan, having figured out a way to defeat Jason after having read books on monsters and folklore: He can be incapacitated by being trapped beneath the surface of the lake where he drowned. Megan attempts to bring Tommy back to the camp, but they are intercepted by one of Garris's roadblocks. Tommy is arrested and Megan is escorted back to the police station to await her father's return from the field. The police's attention on Tommy permits Jason to slip into the summer camp, where he kills Paula and Sissy, but refrains from harming any of the children.

Megan and Tommy escape the police station and make it to the lake, where the pursuing police are forced to acknowledge Jason's return when he attacks them. Garris and his deputies briefly incapacitate Jason by shooting him with high caliber weapons, but Jason ultimately recovers and kills them all. He then attempts to kill Megan, but is distracted by Tommy, who beckons to him from the lake. Seemingly remembering Tommy, Jason abandons Megan and wades out to the lake, where Tommy ambushes him with a chain attached to a large boulder. A fight ensues, during which both Tommy and Jason are knocked into the water; as Tommy attempts to swim to the surface, Jason pulls him underwater and he loses consciousness. Megan swims out to save Tommy and is likewise attacked by Jason, but finally incapacitates him by driving a motor boat propeller into his head.

Back on land, Megan revives Tommy with CPR and the children celebrate

The next day we find the lake is peaceful.  Jason drifts motionless underneath.

But his eye reveals he is still alive.

(Source: imdb.com:  by matt-282, alexcujo, with slight editions)

Worst.  Birthday.  Ever.

Review/Analysis:

Jason Lives:  Friday the 13th Part VI is one of the more underrated films in the series.  While not the best, you can tell the filmmakers wanted to make a good horror film that would both satisfy fans of the series and be a little smarter.  It wouldn't be until Jason X (2001) that the series would again use its awareness of the silly premise as a strength.

What makes it's meta-humor smart is that they know not to make fun of Jason.  This maintains his antagonism as a serious threat.  Victims might spot a horror cliche while it's happening but they won't mock the genre or the killer.

A little back story:

-Tommy Jarvis killed off Jason in Part IV- which was suppose to be "The Final Chapter."

-With that being a gigantic money maker, Part V: A New Beginning was quickly put into production.

-Tommy Jarvis was brought back again as a red herring (Part IV hinted Tommy could become Jason), but audiences were disappointed to find out Roy the ambulance driver was now the killer.

-Skip to Part VI:  Jason Lives, they decide to bring Jason back and who better to resurrect him than the boy who killed him.

One of the earliest meta-scenes is Jason's resurrection.  As a nod to the classic horror story Frankenstein, Tommy Jarvis gives life to his monster through lightning.

This scene ends with a parody of James Bond's iconic gun barrel opening.  Instead of Bond walking in and shooting at us, we jump cut 6x into Jason's eye- the pupil dilates, Jason walks in to slash at the screen.

Coming this Christmas:  Son of a Bond

It's a love it or hate it moment.  For me it works because it establishes that the film isn't taking itself as serious as Parts I and II.

The opening montage with lightning behind clouds, trees silhouetted by moonlight, and fog rolling off the lake effectively capture the mood of a horror film.  But the humor of the piece is harder to establish.  This James Bond parody, not being subtle in anyway, clues the audience in that Jason Lives is a playful movie.

So when Darren and Lizabeth stop short after almost running Jason over, it doesn't feel out of place when she says "I've seen enough horror movies to know any weirdo wearing a mask is never friendly."   

Or when Cort and Nikki can have this exchanged:

             Cort: Check this out.

             [Shows Nikki a shredded power cable]

             Nikki: What happened to it?

             Cort: I don't know, but I suggest if we don't want to look like it we make this place a
             memory right now.

             [Nikki looks at the cord a few seconds and follows Cort meeting him around the other side]

             Cort: Nikki, someone's out there. What if it's that guy, Jason?

Which is kind of nice because the victims aren't as oblivious like in most slasher films.  It's riffing the "investigating a strange noise outside" cliche, but here the character basically says "It's Jason.  No more investigating.  Let's get out of here."  It's almost refreshing... until they revert back for their death scenes.

And there's small things like this shot of a camper sleeping:

"Death Must Enter Life Only to Define it."- Sartre, No Exit

Or Lizabeth trying to buy Jason off before getting the fence post shoved down her throat which results in this:

She should know it's not accepted everywhere.

For literally 10 seconds it just floats there.

I always assumed they were being indolent with their product placement.  But it turns out director Tom McLoughlin put it in as a set-up for a punchline.  The shot is held long enough to allow someone in your audience to yell out "Don't leave home without it" and get a laugh in the theater.

There are three HUGE things that separate Jason Lives from all the other Friday the 13th movies.

1) Welcome To Camp....  Forest Green?

That's right.  Not Crystal Lake.  The reasoning behind this is that after Jason was killed (and after Roy's copy-cat killings, I assume.  They never bring up Part V ), the town decided to change it's name and insist that Jason was not real but a local legend. 

It's not a bad idea, but there's no payoff to it.

Everyone, even the kids, knows about Camp Blood.  They're not fooling anyone.  It would take a few decades for that plan to really pay-off.  Say after a hiatus- like tomorrow they decided to make a follow-up to Jason Takes Manhattan but set it in the present- this town idea might work. But in Jason Lives it makes no difference.  They could of called it Crystal Lake and it would change nothing. 

Not to mention, they just threw the camp sign into the lake:

No one will ever find it here.

2) The Only Friday the 13th With No Nudity

With 80's slasher films, you kind of expect tits. Besides the murder set pieces, tits are like the second reason you are watching these movies.  It's certainly not the story; half these films are the same basic premise and the other half don't even have a plot.

I actually did not notice this film's lack of nudity until it was pointed out to me.  Which says a lot.  To never once get bored enough to ask "when are we going to see some goods" indicates the film held my attention as a kid.

Although, I did see a lot of these slasher films for the first time on TV Shows like USA's Up All Night, so that could also be why it never stuck out, even when I finally bought the VHS.

The film does have one sex scene between Nikki and Cort-  

But the fact that they are clothed is the least odd thing about it

3) There Are Children At The Camp

Having kids in a horror film can be a bit taboo.  You can do anything you want to adults, but kill a dog or a child and usually the audience will turn on you.  Trick 'r Treat (2007) spent years sitting on a shelf because the studio feared a boycott.

Normally, This series got around it by saying the counselors are fixing up the camp before the kids arrive.

And there has been kids in the Friday the 13th films (the prologue in Part 1 for example) and Tommy Jarvis in Part IV (played by Corey Feldman), but this is the only one that has children staying in the camp while Jason is murdering counselors.

Don't worry, Jason Lives doesn't kill off any of them, but teases that it's coming and takes it to the point that all the counselors are dead, leaving Jason alone with the children.

There's one little girl who the filmmakers make stand out.  She has dreams of a monster before Jason arrives, she witnesses Jason carrying Sissy's headless body (come to think of it, where the hell was he taking that body?), and she finds Jason's bloody machete.  We're zeroed in on her out of all the other children.  So when Jason has run out of adults to kill and enters the cabin full of little girls, you know right away which little girl Jason is going to select- the one the filmmakers have made the audience develop feelings for.

"They're making these tramps smaller I see."

The violence in this series is not hardcore by today's standards, but back when it was released many found it to be shocking.  Gene Siskel in his review for Jason Lives called it "... the most offensive series in film history."  Which makes you wonder if he missed all those Naziploitation and Gialli films that were way more misogynistic than any Hollywood Slasher.  Siskel and Ebert even devoted an entire episode to shaming what they called Women in Danger Pictures- making sure to point out Halloween- which they raved about- didn't count because it's art.

Despite how tame most of these 80's slasher films seem by today's standards, almost all of them were cut to receive an R-rating.  Some have been restored; others like Jason Lives probably won't have that luxury.  It's audience is a niche-market despite being a popular series.  It's not cost effective for the studio to put the time and money into something that will sell the same amount of copies the way it is.

In the 80s, there was a cult of fear involving movies (it still exist today).  Someone does a horrible thing:

What music were they listening to?
What video games did they play?
What movie did they watch last?

Stuff that really won't cause a person to commit mass murder but provides an easy digestible answer for mass consumption.  And it gets legitimized by News stations to help their ratings and draw out the coverage whenever there's a school shooting.

In Britain they started banning films.  They even created a list called the Video Nasties.

Whereas in America, we trusted that if the MPAA passed it- it's safe.

In Jason Lives nearly every death is edited and changed in someway. But it wouldn't just affect the finished product.

Even before filming started, they would looked at the storyboards and make guesses about what wouldn't pass.  Nikki's death in the camper is a great example.  Originally Jason was going to rip her throat out.  Knowing the MPAA's reaction, Frank Mancuso Jr told the director to tone it down.

So instead he storyboarded this:

A much more cartoonish death, with Nikki's face getting pushed through the wall and making a perfect mold before the machete stabs through the forehead.

This, of course, becomes edited down further once the MPAA sees it to just this:

Sans machete.

It's lamentable that they did not bring back Tommy Jarvis in the next film. There's a Van Helsing vs. Dracula struggle that deserved to be capitalized on.

It's even more unfortunate in all three films Tommy Jarvis is played by a different actor; making the character have no clear identity.  Halloween has Laurie Strode(Jamie Lee Curtis),  A Nightmare on Elm Street has Nancy(Heather Langenkamp), but Friday the 13th's Tommy Jarvis calls to mind three faces.

It's hard to have a reoccurring character if no one knows what he's going to look like in the next film.

Jason Lives: Friday the 13th Part VI is a good, fun slasher film.  It has that mid-80s slasher quality: a mix of early 80's nihilistic violence as seen through the veil of the MTV generation. 

Damn it, VHS tape!  That's the ending!

Trivia

1) Body count: 18

2) In the script, Jason's father, Elias, makes an appearance visiting his son's grave.  It's the only time he's ever been mentioned in a Friday the 13th film.  Storyboards of it exist.

I don't always visit my son's grave, but when I do I don't buy flowers.

3) Alice Cooper did a tie-in song and music video called He's Back (The Man Behind The Mask).  ENJOY:

-Nicolas Edelbach

Django Unchained: Who is the ancestor?

Tarantino confirmed in an interview that a minor character from Django Unchained is an ancestor of a character from one of his other films.

And most people think it's Koons because of a reddit post, but there is something wrong with this.

Reddit post proof:

First, Tarantino said it's a minor character in Django Unchained. Crazy Craig Koons isn't a character. He's a name on a flyer.

Second, the name next to his is someone named Nash. So why isn't he an ancestor to Marvin Nash from Reservoir Dogs?

Marvin Nash in Reservoir Dogs:

Same reason: he isn't a character.

Then there is Dr. King Schultz. He could be related to Paula Schultz- the grave from Kill Bill vol. 2.   But that doesn't work for two reasons 1) Paula Schultz wasn't a character, she was a name 2) Dr. King Schultz isn't a minor character. So Tarantino didn't mean him. 

Paula Schultz Grave in Kill Bill vol. 2:

(It's been pointed out that Paula Schultz most likely is Dr. King Schultz's dead wife.  Her tombstone has the dates 1823 to 1853 on it, meaning she died 5 years before Django Unchained takes place.)

The answer to the ancestor question should be obvious since he has appeared in almost all of Tarantino's films.

It's actor Michael Parks.

He is playing an ancestor to Texas Ranger Earl McGraw. While his character is unnamed in Django Unchained (A character "SO MINOR" he's just called The LeQuint Dickey Mining Co. Employee), he stands out. He is the only LeQuint Dickey Mining Co. Employee who doesn't have an Australian accent; he has a Texas one.

It might be overlooked because people don't realize Parks is doing a character. They aren't familiar with him in other roles and assume he's not acting. But he plays the The LeQuint Dickey Mining Co. Employee exactly how he would play the Texas Ranger, mannerisms and all.

Michael Parks in Django Unchained:

 Michael Parks as Texas Ranger Earl McGraw:

However, I think Koons, Nash, and Schultz can be considered links to others in the universe, but they aren't who Tarantino was talking about.

Trivia:

Tarantino has stated that Django and Broomhilda are ancestors to Shaft, hence Broomhilda's last name being Von Shaft.

-Nicolas Edelbach

A Guy Named Joe (1943)

Directed by Victor Fleming
Screenplay by Dalton Trumbo
Produced by Everett Riskin
Cinematography by George Folsey and Karl Freund

Key Cast:
Spencer Tracy as Pete Sandidge
Irene Dunne as Dorinda Durston
Van Johnson as Ted Randall
Ward Bond as Al Yackey
James Gleason as 'Nails' Kilpatrick
Lionel Barrymore as The General
Barry Nelson as Dick Rumney
Esther Williams as Ellen Bright

Genre: Drama/Romance/War/Fantasy
Runtime: 2 hours
Country: USA
Budget: $2,627,000 (estimated)
Gross: $5,363,000 (1944)
Filmed from: February 1943- September 1943 (a few pick-ups in November)
Released: December 23, 1943 (USA)

December 23, 1943(USA)

Aspect Ratio: 1.31 : 1

Tagline: A GUY - A GAL - A PAL - It's Swell!

First Image: Title Card

Opening Shot: Planes in the Sky

World War II provides a high stakes back drop to this Hollywood love triangle.  A Guy Named Joe is the kind of film that came out in the 40's with the single goal of comforting its audience.  It's not a call to arms, propaganda film.  It's more about brotherhood, accepting the death of your loved ones, and having courage to move on.  In the wrong hands that could be prosaic, but A Guy Named Joe maintains a light, comedic tone that helps heighten the dramatic and intense moments.

Our protagonist is Pete Sandidge (Spencer Tracy), a cocky bomber pilot who lives for the thrill of the fight.  He's got a girl, Dorinda Durston (Irene Dunne), a ferry pilot, who he wishes would ground herself and get a desk job.  After a daring mission where Pete went lone wolf- flying too low during a bombing raid, he is reprimanded along with his best friend, Al Yackey (Ward Bond) and sent to Scotland to do reconnaissance.  Six months later, Dorinda convinces Pete to transfer to Arizona and teach other pilots; in exchange she'll switch to ground patrol like he wanted.  Pete agrees just as Al comes in to announce they spotted a German Aircraft carrier.  Jumping at the chance for one last mission and ignoring Dorinda's intuition that his number is up, the men engage in a dogfight.  Pete successfully bombs the aircraft carrier... but his plane is damaged by the explosion and crashes into the ocean.

Sent to heaven after he dies, Pete becomes a guardian angel for new pilots.  Along with Dick Rumney (Barry Nelson), a former pilot who Pete watched die, they are sent to Arizona to guide the new recruits.  No one can see or hear them; rather when they speak the other characters assume it's their subconscious.  It's here we meet Ted Randall (Van Johnson), a rich and talented pilot who lacks confidence.   Pete guides him not just in the air, but also in his private life with meeting women.  Soon, Ted becomes an ace fighter pilot like Pete himself was and a year later they station him in Australia under the command of Al Yackey, now a Colonel.

Dorinda, still pining over the loss of Pete, is also stationed there.  At the dance hall, Ted uses Pete's pick-up line on Dorinda.  Seeing much of Pete in him, the two hit it off immediately.  Within a year Ted is promoted to captain and the two become engaged.  Pete's jealousy gets the better of him, and he talks Ted into flying reckless during a training exercise.  Instead of being reprimanded, Ted is assigned a dangerous mission:  blowing up a Japanese ammunition dump.

Meanwhile Pete is called back to heaven and chided for what he did.  The General (Lionel Barrymore) gives a speech to Pete that finally hits home. He puts aside his cockiness and jealousy, realizing he needs to do what is best for everyone.  Dorinda ends up breaking off her marriage, knowing that deep down she still loves Pete and it would not be fair to Ted.  She learns from Yackey that Ted is leaving on a mission with only a slight chance he will come back.

Deciding to sacrifice herself to save Ted, Dorinda steals the plane along with Pete inside and flies off.  Under Pete's guidance, she pulls off the bombing of the Japanese ammunition dump and makes it back safe.  In one final act by Pete, he guides Dorinda to let go of her love for him and to move on with Ted.  She does. The films ends with Ted and Dorinda walking off to their new lives, and Pete walking in the opposite direction, fading into thin air.

While it's not without its flaws, I did love this film.  The performances are great making the characters easy to emphasize with.  However, it's the execution of the story that elevates the material into something special.  It would be difficult to buy all the contrivances if the storytelling was anything less than first-rate.

The two biggest flaws are:

1) Spencer Tracy and Irene Dunne were too old for their parts.

I got over this real fast, but it still sticks out in my mind that I never bought Spencer Tracy as a young hot-shot pilot.  And Irene Dunne, we get her attraction to Van Johnson because of how much Ted reminds her of Pete, but his attraction to her is a bit mysterious.  Dunne is pretty in a wholesome way, but not alluring like a younger actress would be.

You see this at work in an earlier scene with Ellen Bright (Esther Williams), who is the first girl Ted picks up under Pete's guidance.  She's young, she's pretty, she's fun, and there's a connection between the two involving them cheering up a homesick soldier.  It's a great scene.  The kind of scene that tells you everything you need to know about Van Johnson's character.  It also sets up the dramatic irony of using the same pick-up line when Ted and Dorinda meet. 

Now when we get to the romance between Ted and Dorinda, there's nothing wrong with how it's written. You know where it's heading; the film is respectful enough not to spoon feed you like a child. But the fact that Irene Dunne looks old enough to be Van Johnson's mother did give me the sense that I was rooting for them not because they belong together, but because the film want wants me to root for them.

2) A much bigger flaw is the last ten minutes of the film:

Endings are delicate things.  Nine out of ten times we know where it's going. It's how well the ending is done that determines whether it's good or bad.

Here, the film goes overboard when Dorinda steals the B-32 bomber.

It doesn't completely fall apart because dramatically it's effective.  We need a scene for Tracy to fulfill his character's arc and for Dunne to finally move on from her loss of him.

The problem is it ask the audience to accept that she can pull off the mission and everything will be fine afterward.  Pete coaching Ted is one thing- he's a trained bomber.  Pete coaching a ferry pilot? For what Yackey tells her is a suicide mission?

Maybe it's meant to put the audience on the edge of their seat, but she pulls it off with no problems and the diffusion of tension feels anti-climatic.

When she gets back to base, there are no consequences for her actions.  Considering how important this mission was there should be hell to pay.  Police need to be there to pick her up; someone should be waiting to take her for a psychiatric evaluation.  Under the circumstances, Dorinda's superiors have an obligation to question her stability. This isn't the kind of mission that gets swept under the mat: bombing one of two Japanese ammunition dumps is sure to make the front page of all the newspapers.  She shouldn't be able to walk off into the night like nothing happened.

You could argue that realism isn't too important; this is a movie where a guy goes to heaven and becomes a guardian angel.  But it kind of is, because it's established so often that there are consequences to actions.  The reason Pete and Al are sent to Scotland is a consequence for how they perform their missions.  Later, he tries to get Ted in trouble by piloting recklessly.  Pete dies on a mission.  They inhabit a world with real consequences.

It's lazy compared to how smart the rest of the film is with this kind of plotting.  To all of a sudden throw out the film's own internal logic left a bad taste in my mouth.

That said, there is much to be praised in this film.

The scene in Scotland hits the perfect ominous tone.  The way it's lit and the use of fog has Karl Freund's signature all over it, harkening back to his German Expressionist works and the Universal Horror films.

Dorinda hugs Pete, and over his shoulder she sees his B-25 bomber shrouded in a haze.  The soundtrack is quiet, all the mood comes from the velvet atmosphere and the lurking plane which Pete refers to as "a ghost."  There's an impending doom, a foreboding that lingers.  The audience knows as well as Dorinda that Pete's "number is up," and we are waiting to see how.  When the spur of the moment mission comes, we, like Dorinda, become helpless to save Pete.  It's his cockiness, his character's flaw, that ultimately does him in.

The filmmakers use the fog as an effective transition from Scotland to the cloudy heavens.  This is the best visual transition in the film.  The best audio transition comes after Pete helps guide James Rourke (Don DeFore) using football metaphors.  When Rourke lands, he explains to Ted how it reminded him of the big game he played in.  The film cuts to inside the dance hall where Rourke is finishing his story- only now he's telling it to two young girls.

Fittingly for a movie about a love triangle, there are many patterns evoking the number three:

The most obvious being the actors are literally staged in triangular patterns.  Ted Randall doesn't enter the picture until about halfway, so in the earlier scenes Al Yackey completes the triangular staging with Pete and Dorinda.

There are three action scenes (One for each in the love triangle): Pete's bombing of the German aircraft carrier, Ted defending the Australian base from an attack, and the ending with Dorinda stealing the B-32 to blow up the Japanese ammunition.

Pete gives Ted the pick-up line of telling girls they look like his sister.  He uses it first on Ellen Bright, the second time to try and pick up an Asian waitress, and the third time on Dorinda.  The irony builds during each use.  With the Asian waitress it's used for humor. By the third time he comes out and tells Dorinda he doesn't have a sister.  Dorinda then uses it to share a little white lie with Ted, telling Yackey that in fact Ted has 11 sisters.

Pete dies after meeting up with Dorinda three times.  The first when she lands an hour late, the second time at the inn when he gives her the dress ("Girl clothes! From London!"), and lastly in Scotland.

Ted and Dorinda become engaged by their third scene together.  They meet at the dance hall, next after the attack on the Australian base, and lastly after his promotion when he proposes to her.

There is also three reprimand scenes.  At the beginning, Pete's plane crash lands at the English base.  'Nails' Kilpatrick(James Gleason) confronts Pete with photographs showing him flying too low.  A payoff to this that when Ted meets with Kilpatrick for his reprimand, he is given a dangerous mission- the kind of job Pete would have died for.  Following this, Pete is brought up to heaven and reprimanded by Lionel Barrymore, who is heaven's stand-in for the Kilpatrick-role.

And the most important are the three poetic monologues in the film:

At the start, a group of kids watch a squadron of planes come in and know its Pete Sandidge returning.  There's the incongruous touch of the kids praising Pete's flying and Kilpatrick saying he's trouble.  An effective scene that shows us both the positives and negatives of his character.  His nonchalant crash landing into the film tells you all the rest.  However, it's when he sits down with the kids and they ask him to describe flying solo that we realize how passionate he is.  He compares being up in the sky to hearing heavenly music.

Later on, Lionel Barrymore gives a similar speech, describing a feeling that only pilots who fly solo know about.  In essence, a feeling where everything in the world makes sense.  You see it in Tracy's face the moment his character realizes all the mistakes he has made in life.

And then another similar poetic speech right after Dorinda blows up the ammunition.  Pete tells her to lift the plane to the heavens, to hear the music.  And it's while they are up there, where she thinks she is flying solo, that Pete uses the speech again- only this time he's using the speech to transform her feelings, to free her so she can move on with Ted.

For me, when analyzing a film, the most interesting thing to study is what the film omits.  The use of omission always trips me up in my own writing. When can I jump six months ahead in my character's life without the audience going "Hey, wait a minute?" So, let's look at some specific uses of omission in A Guy Named Joe.

The film starts with a squadron returning home to their base in England.  They had just engaged in a successful raid where no one was injured but one plane was damaged.  The damaged plane turns out to be Pete's and he crash lands back at the base.  Most likely a film today would start off showing the raid despite it being unnecessary.   The use of the kids along with Kilpatrick and Pete's attitude when he gets out of the plane sets-up the character in a way that seeing him piloting wouldn't.  It also creates a desire to see him perform- which we will in Scotland.

There is a balance in only showing the crash landing and not the dogfight; it tells the audience there will be action but this is not an action movie. An important distinction.

In response to the crash, Kilpatrick sends Pete to Scotland to do reconnaissance work.

It's done as much out of concern- Kilpatrick worrying that Pete's devil-may-care attitude will only get him killed-  and as a punishment- because reconnaissance means Pete won't be engaging in any action, the one thing he lives for.

Pete and Yackey spend six months in Scotland bored stiff.  But the film doesn't give us a montage, or show a scene of them humorously trying to get along.  Instead, those six months are omitted from the film.  We cut right to Pete's final night, sitting slouched over, and looking bored.  That one single image of Tracy sums up their entire reconnaissance work for six months.  It's been everything he thought it was going to be.

Showing the maturing of a character is sometimes a hard thing to do because as a writer you might worry you're not giving enough to validate the growth.  When Pete first meets Ted, he lacks confidence.  Both in the air and on the ground amongst women.  Ted's the kind of guy who sits in the dance hall reading a book.  It's through Pete's confident advice that Ted puts down the book and ask Ellen Bright to dance.  The camera films his walk over to her, giving the action its proper weight to show how nervous he is to be doing this.

Next, we see Ted on a date with a group of people (and a different girl), where he is telling a story about a man who works in a saw mill and keeps dismembering himself only to grow his limbs back.  Who knows how much time has passed between this scene and the Ellen Bright scene, but we learn not only is Ted having fun taking out a lot of girls, but he is confident enough to be in the spotlight.  His character has jumped to a new level of maturity. The audience can assume that his piloting has become more confident under Pete's guidance as well.  In a way, he is becoming like Pete.

It's this transformation that allows the next series of omissions to work: the romancing of Dorinda.

In real life, they say the more time you spend with a person, the more likely you are to pick up their mannerisms and habits.  It's the same here- Van Johnson doesn't start doing a Spencer Tracy impression, but his character recites Pete's words ("Hey, you look like my sister.") and little gestures.

There's a scene where Ted starts pulling at his eyebrow, an action that reminds Dorinda of the last night she spent with Pete.  It doesn't help that Ted compares it to picking the petals off a flower- the same thing Pete said.  We don't have trouble buying the relationship going from their first meeting to being engaged two scenes later because we see the melding of Pete and Ted. 

We've also gotten use to the idea of scenes being placed next to each other happening months apart. If the beginning did not jump 6 months ahead to Pete's last day in Scotland or Ted's maturing did not occur between two splices, maybe it wouldn't work.  But the way the story unfolds, it's become a stylistic choice that is in keeping with the film's structure.  To use a very cheesy pun:  Time flies by in this film.

Another smart touch was the omission of a villain.  We never see the Nazis or the Japanese.  This lack of identification is the main reason I said this isn't a call to arms propaganda film.   We are never given a face to hate; they are a danger hidden in the background of what's really important.

With the love triangle, despite Spencer Tracy being in every scene with Van Johnson, Ted is never fighting Pete for Dorinda. Ted has no ill will because he has no awareness of Pete's presence.   

I appreciate the film using this irony sparingly.  It would be easy to capitalize on in every scene but instead it's only pointed out in one great line:  right after Dorinda breaks off her engagement to Ted, he leaves saying "Do you mind if I hate Pete?  Just for a little while?" unaware that he is leaving on a deadly mission with Pete as his guardian angel. 

A Guy Named Joe is an underrated classic. It's exciting, romantic, and leaves you on a high note.

Trivia:

1) Pete Sandidge dies while bombing a German aircraft carrier.  The Germans didn't have aircraft carriers in World War II.

2) Van Johnson was injured in a car accident during filming.  Spencer Tracy refused to let the producers replace him, forcing them to shoot around his part.  Van Johnson later came back and finished the role.  The film was a hit making Van Johnson an instant star.

3) Steven Spielberg loved the film so much he remade it as Always(1989)

4) There is no guy named Joe in the film.  The title refers to slang during World War II- calling another pilot Joe implied he was a good guy.


-Nicolas Edelbach