Q&A with John Kenneth Muir

Cinema Sentries interviewed John Kenneth Muir about his new book An Askew View 2: The Films of Kevin Smith. Here is a taste of the interview. Visit their website to read the whole thing.

 

What do you not like about what is going on with film criticism in this day and age?

To talk about the status of film criticism today, some people cannot thread that needle so they make it personal. They decide they don’t like Ben Affleck because he dated Jennifer Lopez and they review his movie based on the fact that they don’t like him rather than what the quality of the movie was. It’s a lot of personal grudge criticism that I don’t like.

I really like that you brought that up in An Askew View 2. You talked about the personal issues that Kevin Smith had been going through and reviewers glomming on to those issues instead of really reviewing his films. It seems like we are in a time where many journalists don’t know where the line is between gossip and real facts.

I agree with you. There are two points in Kevin Smith’s career where that happened. It happened with Jersey Girl and the Bennifer thing. Then it happened with Cop Out with the Southwest thing. Any critic can respond to either of those films positively or negatively. But whether Kevin Smith was booted off a plane for his weight doesn’t play into the quality of Cop Out. If you don’t like buddy-cop movies, say you don’t like buddy-cop movies and this doesn’t work for A,B, and C. But you don’t go after a guy for his weight and make that the headline…focus on the work. I think the fact that we pass judgement on actors or directors based on the flow of information through gossip sites and gossip tv shows is very problematic.

Do you feel a connection to Kevin Smith since you are both from New Jersey?

The thing that appeals to me about Kevin Smith is, yes I’m from New Jersey, but beyond that the generational thing is important to me. As a director, he speaks to the issues that interest me in a way that interests me. Like wow, he’s talking about these things as I’m going through them. As he’s faling in love and getting married, I’m falling in love and getting married. As he is contemplating his religion and faith, that’s what I’m doing. As he has a child, now I have a child. It’s like wow he’s going through it right there with me. That’s why I don’t want him to quit. Because when he’s going into the nursing home and I’m going into the nursing home, I want that movie.

There is a kinship I feel with Kevin Smith. The examples he uses in his films, the films he alludes to, just his whole manner of being. The way the men and women in his films talk is the way that me and my buddies and my wife talk. Hopefully not as foulmouthed, but that’s what makes it funny. This is a guy from my generation who made it and who is making the movies about us and our lives and what we are going through. That is the thing about Kevin Smith for me. He creates these universal stories but gives them touchstones that we can recognize being from that generation.

Read the rest of this interview on Cinema Sentries.

In the year 2002, An Askew View: The Films of Kevin Smith was the first book to gaze at the cinema of one of New Jersey’s favorite sons, the independent and controversial auteur ofClerks (1994), Mallrats (1995), Chasing Amy (1997), Dogma (1999) and Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back (2001). Now, a full decade after that successful original edition, award-winning author John Kenneth Muir returns to the View Askewniverse to consider Kevin Smith’s second controversial decade as a film director, social gadfly, and beloved media “talker.” From Jersey Girl (2004) to the controversial Zack and Miri Make a Porno (2008), from the critically deridedCop-Out (2010) to the incendiary and provocative horror film Red State (2011), An Askew View 2 studies the Kevin Smith movie equation as it exists today, almost two full decades after Smith maxed out his credit card, made Clerks with his friends, shopped it at Sundance, and commenced his Hollywood journey. In addition to Kevin Smith’s films, An Askew View 2 remembers the short-lived Clerks cartoon (2000) and diagrams the colorful Smith Lexicon.

Kevin Smith’s Top Five Independent–or Outrageous–Moves

Guest Blogger: John Kenneth Muir is the author of An Askew View 2: The Films of Kevin Smith (Applause Books)

New Jersey-ite and Generation X role model, Kevin Smith commenced his film career with the low-budget Clerks in 1993, a “slacker” comedy that is now synonymous with the independent film movement of the 1990s.  Although Clerks is nearly two-decades back in our rear-view mirrors at this point, Smith’s essential nature as an independent — and occasionally outrageous — filmmaker and social gadfly has remained consistent.

Enumerated below are Smith’s five most independent and/or outrageous career moves:

1. Smith bankrolled his own first feature film, the aforementioned Clerks by maxxing out his credit cards to pay for the film’s budget.

In the end, Clerks personally cost Smith more than $30,000 dollars, but the film sold at Sundance for over $200,000 dollars and effectively became Smith’s calling card to Hollywood.  In this same span, Smith also quit film school and used the last tuition bill to jump-start his film budget.

2. Smith has perpetually questioned the “dogma” of both the left and right political spectrum in his film career, clashing with William Donohue’s Catholic League over his religious comedy Dogma (1999) and with GLAAD over the colorful humor in Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back (2001).

Smith doesn’t necessarily court these social controversies, but he is not shy, either, about contending with them.  Smith’s much-publicized battles with the left and right have made him not only an extremely keen observer of human nature, but one who – surprisingly in Hollywood – is not widely viewed as an overt partisan.  In essence, Smith remains an equal opportunity offender, a fact which makes the artist, in many instances, an “honest broker.”

3. The director in 2011 questioned the status quo in Hollywood between critics and studio marketing departments, and then formulated a positive response: a program called “Spoilers” on Hulu that democratizes film criticism.

Sure, Smith is wrong about film criticism being a useless profession.  At Comic-Con in 2012 he railed against film critics writing about “other people’s shit” instead of making their own shit, a rich contradiction for a filmmaker who constructed his fan base, in part, by commenting humorously on other people’s shit, namely Star Wars (1977) and Jaws (1975).  It’s also abundantly plain that Smith’s talent has been held up, affirmed, transmitted and defended by many great film critics, from Amy Taubin to the late Andrew Sarris (who compared the filmmaker to Martin Scorsese).

At its best, film criticism can be a high-minded form of art appreciation, and surely Smith — who has never been shy in sounding off, himself, about other films (from Spider-Man [2003] to Lord of the Rings [2001] and The Transformers [2007])) — must understand that.  Yet Spoilersundeniably continues the national conversation about film, and provides an alternative to those (mostly online) critics who constantly spew bile and seem to have personal axes to grind against filmmakers, actors, and even franchises.  In other words, Smith has provided us another venue to continue talking about our love of movies.

4. Smith self-distributed his own film, Red State in 2011, thus creating for budding filmmakers a new commercial paradigm. 

In 1993, Smith seized control of the actual process of filmmaking by bankrolling Clerks.  At Sundance in 2011, he launched another experiment, this one involving artist control over how films are seen, an eschewing of huge marketing campaigns and saturation advertising.  The bottom line is that insanity is often defined as doing the same thing over and over again, and expecting different result.  By taking control of Red State’s distribution himself, Smith at the very least attempted something new.  Hollywood’s blistering, indignant response is proof positive that Smith’s independence struck a nerve.

5. He confounded career expectations and made a balls-to-the-wall horror movie.

By 2011, Kevin Smith was known widely as a director of raunchy comedies. He turned that perception upside down by creating the visceral, brutal Red State, a horror film of accomplished technique and blistering social critique.  He has now successfully expanded the term “a Kevin Smith film” considerably, revealing that his tell-tale Generation X wit and humor also boasts a dark side.

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An Askew View 2: The Films of Kevin Smith by John Kenneth Muir

In the year 2002, An Askew View: The Films of Kevin Smith was the first book to gaze at the cinema of one of New Jersey’s favorite sons, the independent and controversial auteur ofClerks (1994), Mallrats (1995), Chasing Amy (1997), Dogma (1999) and Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back (2001). Now, a full decade after that successful original edition, award-winning author John Kenneth Muir returns to the View Askewniverse to consider Kevin Smith’s second controversial decade as a film director, social gadfly, and beloved media “talker.” From Jersey Girl (2004) to the controversial Zack and Miri Make a Porno (2008), from the critically deridedCop-Out (2010) to the incendiary and provocative horror film Red State (2011), An Askew View 2 studies the Kevin Smith movie equation as it exists today, almost two full decades after Smith maxed out his credit card, made Clerks with his friends, shopped it at Sundance, and commenced his Hollywood journey. In addition to Kevin Smith’s films, An Askew View 2remembers the short-lived Clerks cartoon (2000) and diagrams the colorful Smith Lexicon.

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Prince’s Birthday: A Celebration of Purple Rain

John Kenneth Muir is the author of Purple Rain: Music on Film. Below is an excerpt as posted on Movieline.com.

Meeting His Majesty, Prince

The next task at hand was to introduce Magnoli to Prince, and simultaneously, for Magnoli to further familiarize himself with the artist, his background, and his works. Magnoli knew and had liked the 1982 Prince hit singles “1999” and “Little Red Corvette.” He held a powerful image of the artist as “a loner” and “iconoclastic,” but more research was still necessary to get an authentic feel for the man and the performer.

So, while he finished an editing job on a Wednesday and Thursday and prepared for a flight to Minneapolis on Friday to meet his movie’s star, Magnoli wanted to learn everything he could about the musician. “I didn’t know his early career,” Magnoli acknowledged.

“‘Send to the editing room every video and any foot¬age you have on Prince, so I can see the visuals,’” Magnoli remembers saying to Cavallo on the phone. “So he sent me all of this video of Prince in concert in Minneapolis, and it was during his bikini-wearing, high-heel wearing, long coat days. This was prior to the 1999 album, where I think he had his self-titled album Prince . . . I think that’s what it was called. He was wearing a jacket on the cover [of the album] with a bikini bottom, with his chest sticking out, looking very androgynous.

Keep reading on Movieline.com…

Purple Rain: Music on Film

In the summer of 1984, a small, low-budget film came out of nowhere and unexpectedly debuted at the number one slot at the box office, unseating reigning champion Ghostbusters and making its star, Prince, a household name. By the end of the year, the film was a multiple-award winner, a trend setter in terms of fashion, and recognized on many prominent critical “top ten” lists. Purple Rain: Music on Film explores in detail the behind-the-scenes struggles and triumphs of the film’s making, from the trouble casting a female lead to star opposite Prince, to concerns that the movie’s urban vibe and sound wouldn’t play in Peoria. Featuring extensive new interviews with the film’s director, producer, and assistant editor, Purple Rain reveals a 1980s cult-classic as you’ve never seen, heard or experienced it before. Let’s go crazy…

Purple Rain Excerpt

The following is an excerpt posted by Bookgasm from Purple Rain: Music on Film by John Kenneth Muir.

“I saw a movie called Reckless (1984), in a screening room, which was done by Jamie Foley,” Robert Cavallo explains. That cult film was a rebellious rock ’n’ roll anthem featuring Aidan Quinn and Daryl Hannah as star-crossed lovers in an American steel town, and it featured a pulsing, hard-rock soundtrack from the likes of INXS, Bob Seger, and Romeo Void.

“I was alone in the screening room, other than a young man sitting in the back,” Cavallo says. “As I walked out, the young man said to me, ‘Well, what did you think?’ And I said, ‘It was pretty good … but I especially enjoyed the editing.’ I wasn’t kidding. It was good. I thought it was really well edited,” Cavallo emphasizes. “And he said, ‘Oh, I did that. Jamie’s my friend; he made the movie, and I was the editor. We went to USC film school.’”

That young man was Albert Magnoli, a native of Connecticut and a recent graduate of USC School of Cinematic Arts (until 2006 named the School of Cinema-Television). He had discovered his interest in film during undergraduate school, and almost unexpectedly.

“I grew up in New England, in Connecticut, and in undergraduate school, I took a course—I was a literature major—that pretty much changed my life,” Mr. Magnoli remembered. “It was a course that dealt with the films of Ingmar Bergman and how they related to literature; Bergman in relation to stories and novels. The professor was extremely good at finding comparisons between Ingmar Bergman’s philosophies and the philosophies of Kierkegaard, Dostoyevsky, etc.

“We tracked Ingmar Bergman from the 1950s all the way to, at that time, the 1970s, and that was an extremely rich time for Ingmar Bergman,” Magnoli reminisces. “He started off doing romantic comedies and then concentrated on films that dealt with his background and religious philosophy. We watched The Seventh Seal (1957), Persona (1966), Shame (1968), and Cries and Whispers (1972) and they just had an enormous impact on me.

“What ended up happening was, there was a film course being offered in the school. I wasn’t part of it, but someone in the course came to me and asked if I had any short stories that could be turned into a short film,” the director says. “At the time I was writing short stories, and said I had one, and gave it to him. The location of that story needed a factory, and I had worked in a factory during the summer months, so I said, ‘I have a factory, and it’s down in Newington. I’ll talk to the manager and see if he’ll let us film in there.’ And sure enough, he did. He let us film from midnight till six a.m.

“We had one night to do it,” Magnoli details. “So I brought my friend and his crew to this factory. We were all juniors in college at the time. And when we got there, he looked at me and said, ‘Where should the camera go?’”

“I said, ‘I thought this was your film class!’ And he said, ‘I’m just the choreographer, not the director. You know the factory—just tell me where to put the camera.’ I said, ‘Well, let me see what the camera looks like.’ It was a little Super 8 camera on a tripod. I looked through the viewfinder, and at that point I knew where the camera should go. And then I started setting up shots. Essentially, we filmed for the next five or six hours. We had our actors, we finished, and as I was riding back to college, I said to my friend, ‘This is very interesting.’”

Keep reading this excerpt on Bookgasm…

Purple Rain: Music on Film

In the summer of 1984, a small, low-budget film came out of nowhere and unexpectedly debuted at the number one slot at the box office, unseating reigning champion Ghostbusters and making its star, Prince, a household name. By the end of the year, the film was a multiple-award winner, a trend setter in terms of fashion, and recognized on many prominent critical “top ten” lists. Purple Rain: Music on Film explores in detail the behind-the-scenes struggles and triumphs of the film’s making, from the trouble casting a female lead to star opposite Prince, to concerns that the movie’s urban vibe and sound wouldn’t play in Peoria. Featuring extensive new interviews with the film’s director, producer, and assistant editor, Purple Rain reveals a 1980s cult-classic as you’ve never seen, heard or experienced it before. Let’s go crazy…

Four Reasons Why Purple Rain (1984) Endures

Guest Blogger: John Kenneth Muir, author of Purple Rain: Music on Film

Just past the quarter-century mark, director Albert Magnoli’s Purple Rain (1984) continues to fascinate and intrigue global audiences.  An MTV-era update of the classic back-stage musical format, Purple Rain introduced a wide audience to Prince and his world in the Minneapolis music scene.

Although the Reagan decade is long since over – as is the Prince fashion craze of ruffled collars – Purple Rain continues to gain enthusiastic new fans the world around. Here are four reasons why:

1. Purple Rain is as close to getting “to know” the real Prince as we’re likely to get.

The artist who changed his name to an unpronounceable symbol and declared the Internet “dead” in 2010 is an enigmatic, mysterious fellow.  What makes him tick?  From what inner turmoil does his creative genius derive?

Although featuring a heavily fictionalized account of his life, Purple Rain remains the closest we are likely to get to an authentic Prince screen biography.  The film reveals the turmoil in his home life among his parents, and the relationships roiling Prince’s band mates in the Revolution.

At the start of Purple Rain, Prince emerges from smog and fog in silhouette and finally becomes visible…at least for the duration of the movie. This is as clearly as we have ever viewed the man, and his later films, including Under the Cherry Moon (1985) and Graffiti Bridge (1990) assiduously steered away from offering any further biographical detail.

2. The film is multi-faceted in its depiction of an icon. 

We’ve all seen big-screen musical biographies, and most often, they gloss over warts to forge a heroic, larger-than-life portrait of a talent we’ve come to love.  Consider Cool as Ice (1990), or even 8 Mile (2002), both of which failed to capture the real life experience or apparent rage driving performers such as Vanilla Ice or Eminem.

Or consider the superficial, bubble gum Rick Springfield vehicle, Hard to Hold (1984).  By contrast, Purple Rain reveals Prince in all his flawed and human dimensions.  He’s a genius, but he’s difficult.  He’s talented, but he’s demanding.  He’s an iconoclast and a perfectionist, and he’s anchored by nagging self-doubt.

In one of the film’s most famous scene, Prince sits back-stage – sulking in his tent as it were – making funny voices with a hand-puppet.  He comes off as angst-ridden, self-centered, and isolated.  Purple Rain is willing to reveal Prince in all his human shades, even the unflattering ones, and that’s why some critics (including Roger Ebert) listed it as one of the top ten films of 1984.

3. Purple Rain is the perfect fusion of music and meaning.

While prepping Purple Rain, director Magnoli had the opportunity to choose a wide array of tunes from Prince’s (largely) unpublished music catalog.  Selecting from over a hundred such pieces, Magnoli was able to tailor the music directly to the film’s biographical content.

“Let’s Go Crazy,” the opening anthem, played as an introduction to Prince’s world.

“Take me with U” concerns the open road, and the burgeoning of a romance between Prince and Apollonia.

The song’s opposite, “Darling Nikki” is about betrayal and rage in a romantic relationship…a humiliating song for Apollonia to endure.

The climactic tune “Purple Rain” concerns forgiveness and love, and has been called a celebration of women, or what critic David Denby termed “both an apology for bad behavior and a promise of sexual ecstasy.”

Finally, “Baby I’m a Star” is valediction, heroic triumph after challenges external and internal are beaten back.

Even the song written expressly for the film, “When Doves Cry,” reflects beautifully the film’s thematic content.  It’s re-states the film’s central conflict: that Prince may be “just like his father,” a failure in love and in music.

4. Morris Day and Jerome.

How many back-stage or biographical musicals expend the time and energy to create competitors for their heroes, especially competitors that serve so adroitly as comic relief?

Morris Day and Jerome Benton lighten up Purple Rain tremendously, and give the film a jaunty, humorous bent.

Morris Day and Jerome proved so intensely popular as foils for Prince that Purple Rain producer Robert Cavallo wanted to make a sequel to Purple Rain…about the duo making further mischief in Las Vegas.

Purple Rain: Music on Film

In the summer of 1984, a small, low-budget film came out of nowhere and unexpectedly debuted at the number one slot at the box office, unseating reigning champion Ghostbusters and making its star, Prince, a household name. By the end of the year, the film was a multiple-award winner, a trend setter in terms of fashion, and recognized on many prominent critical “top ten” lists. Purple Rain: Music on Film explores in detail the behind-the-scenes struggles and triumphs of the film’s making, from the trouble casting a female lead to star opposite Prince, to concerns that the movie’s urban vibe and sound wouldn’t play in Peoria. Featuring extensive new interviews with the film’s director, producer, and assistant editor, Purple Rain reveals a 1980s cult-classic as you’ve never seen, heard or experienced it before. Let’s go crazy…

Visit John Kenneth Muir’s blog, Reflections on Film/TV

11 Reasons Why This is Spinal Tap Still Rocks

Guest Blogger: John Kenneth Muir, author of This is Spinal Tap: Music on Film, An Askew View, The Rock and Roll Film Encyclopedia, Mercy in Her Eyes, Best in Show, The Unseen Force, TV Year, and the forthcoming Purple Rain: Music on Film

Today goes up to eleven. Or three elevens, really, if we’re being technical.  But since today is 11/11/11, it seems an appropriate occasion to remember the production that made the idea of “going up to eleven” a famous (or infamous) catchphrase: 1984’s This is Spinal Tap.  Even twenty-seven years after release, the Rob Reiner comedy endures as one of the funniest ever made, and so below I enumerate the eleven reasons the film continues to “rock.”

1. Nobody does it better, to quote vintage Carly Simon, circa 1976.  There have been other rock-and-roll comedies such as Rock Star (2002) and other mock documentaries such as CB-4 (2002) or FUBAR (2002) but none has demonstrated the longevity or appeal of This is Spinal Tap. A quarter century later, this mockumentary remains the untopped gold standard of the form.
2. The music is great, even without the comedy.  For all their hilarious lyrics, the rock anthems in This is Spinal Tap are pretty damned good in their own right, perhaps because the film’s stars – Christopher Guest, Harry Shearer, and Michael McKean – composed and performed them themselves.  The up-shot is you can tap your toes to hits like “Sex Farm,” “Big Bottom,” “Hellhole,” “Stonehenge” and rest, even if you have absolutely no sense of humor, or no familiarity whatsoever with heavy metal.
3.  It’s “based on a true story.”  Okay, well not really.  But the events of This is Spinal Tap and the story of a hapless rock band on tour certainly ring true.  For instance, Bob Dylan got lost behind stage in the documentary film Don’t Look Back, just like Tap did at its NC stop in the comedy.  In 1956, Screamin’ Jay Hawkin was trapped in a coffin on stage, not unlike Derek Small’s entrapment in an embryonic “pod” during one performance.  And stagecraft is just part of the story.  Tap is also bedeviled by a diva in Jeanine (June Chadwick), a latter day Yoko Ono or Anita Pallenberg, and director Marty Di Bergi sure looks a lot like Marty Scorsese in The Last Waltz (1978), doesn’t he?
4.  It’s highly quotable.  Besides Napoleon Dynamite, has there been another cult film that created as many famous quotes as This is Spinal Tap?  The film brought us not only the ubiquitous “this goes up to eleven,” but “there’s a fine line between stupid and clever,” “you can’t dust for vomit,” and a host of others.
5. It evokes on nostalgia for the 1980s.  The year of Spinal Tap – 1984 – was also the year of Prince’s debut film, Purple Rain, Ghostbusters, Gremlins and other pop-culture touchstones.  When we watch Spinal Tap, we remember not only that bygone year, but the Reagan decade itself, and the era of hair bands, Rubik cubes, and Smurfs.
6. We all like to slow down and watch a train wreck.  Today, “embarrassment” or cringe-inducing humor is incredibly popular thanks to comics such as Larry David or Ricky Gervais. This is Spinal Tap perfected this particular brand of humor more than two decades ago, and there’s something incredibly compelling about watching a film about a band falling apart; about a tour that goes straight to hell.  As human beings, we’re drawn to train wrecks, and This is Spinal Tap is one band’s slow-motion train wreck…a fact which makes us rubber-neckers, I suppose.
7. It’s not just a movie. Spinal Tap is a philosophy of life.  In September of 2000, a reader wrote to The New York Times and opined that This is Spinal Tap possesses many of the answers to coping with life’s stresses.  For instance, the writer suggests that remarks such as “I’ll rise above it, I’m a professional” and “It’s a problem; it gets solved” possess a deep if simple sense of wisdom.
8. It’s not just funny. It’s smart.  This is Spinal Tap is a real movie about a fake band; and a fake documentary too.  Scholars have crafted lengthy dissertations on the film and its significance, not just in terms of the form (aping cinema verite), but in terms of content.  Over a decade ago, Carl Plangina wrote “Gender, Power and a Cucumber: Satirizing Masculinity in This is Spinal Tap” which exposed how the film utilized satire to expose the hyper-masculine mythology of the heavy metal milieu.
9. It’s about “projecting power,” or “perseverance.” The makers of Spinal Tap labored hard over a period of years to bring us the film, but in the body of the comedy itself, we watch with a sense of admiration as Nigel, David and Derek face each new dilemma and setback with a determination that the show must go on; even if the audience is getting smaller, or their appeal is growing “more selective.”
10. The humor seems wicked, but the film is actually affectionate.  Tap faces some tough times on its American tour, and meets with some harsh, ego-destroying realities.  And yet This is Spinal Tap never feels truly mean-spirited.  The band members may be dolts, but they’re well-meaning dolts that we care about, and wish to see succeed.  We root for Tap, even when they are dealing with midgets, or playing at air force bases.
11. There but for the grace of God go I.  I’ll be honest here: I’ve had a few Spinal Tap moments myself, either at conventions, or at under-attended book signings.  Spinal Tap reminds us all how lucky we are when such things go well, and how – frankly — things could be worse, even when we believe we’re having a bad day.

 THIS IS SPINAL TAP: Music on Film
In 1984, four comedians – Christopher Guest, Michael McKean, Rob Reiner, and Harry Shearer – unleashed This Is Spinal Tap, the world’s first “mock-rockumentary” and a joke that has lasted into the 21st century and inspired a generation of imitations. Now, award-winning film journalist John Kenneth Muir (An Askew View: The Films of Kevin Smith) escorts the reader through a quarter-century of heavy metal laughs, offering a detailed history of the film’s genesis and an up-close look at the reasons why this beloved rock-and-roll movie comedy has endured for so long, – and even met acceptance in the rock-and-roll culture it lampoons. Features interview material with the cinematographer, editor, and some supporting cast members of This Is Spinal Tap as well as “King of Nostalgia” Joe Franklin.
Available for purchase here.

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