Jason's Blog, page 183

The king of comics

This was a strip done for a Norwegian newspaper to illustrate an interview they did with me. A little explanation might be required: The Phantom, Donald Duck and Beetle Bailey are very popular comic book characters in Scandinavia and have their own magaines.

Rushmore

Jason Schwartzman is a student at Rushmore Academy. He falls in love with one of the teachers there, Olivia Williams. So does tycoon Bill Murray. Directed by Wes Anderson.

Ah, pure magic! I watch it about once every year. Of the Depressed Bill Murray films, I think this is the best one. I was never that crazy about Lost in Translation, really. Good actors and direction, but a weak script. And what was that Lip my stockings about? Anyway... What a great cast this film has! Schwartzman and Murray are brilliant. There's Brian Cox and Seymour Cassel, and Olivia Williams... yes, I can understand why everybody was so besotted by her.

It's still my favourite Anderson film. The later films were more and more visually stunning, but also less interesting, the characters less believable. Rushmore is a quirky film, but you believe in the characters and care about what happens to them. Quirky is a tricky thing. Overdo it and it rings false, like in Garden State. I've wondered about directors who early have a strong voice. Do Wes Anderson or Tarantino ever write a script, stop and say, I can't write that, that's too Wes Anderson, that's too Tarantino? Because with that recognizable voice I would imagine there's always the risk of tipping into parody. Not that that has happened. And I thought Fantastic Mr Fox was a return to form from Anderson.

The nineties

Well, I guess they made a couple of good films in the nineties as well. This is one of them: One False Move. Billy Bob Thornton is a ruthless killer. Him and his girlfriend and his partner are headed back to his hometown in Arkansas. What they don't know is that the town sheriff, Bill Paxton, and two cops from LA are waiting for them. Co-written by Thornton, directed by Carl Franklin.

It's a small masterpiece, a mix of modern film noir and a variation of High Noon. The story follows the two cops and Paxton, but also the killers and the woman as they are travelling south, slowly building tension. All of the characters seem real, none of them simply clichés. Paxton plays the kind of happy go lucky-guy he was very good at, but with a dark secret. It's a great, Oscar worthy performance. There is some violence in the film, and it's not pretty, but violence shouldn't be. The film ends in a calm, strangely poetic scene, that could easily have been too sentimental, but that like the rest of the film finds the right tone.

Badminton, D.V.?

Tennis, D.V.?

Stripes

From as issue of Mjau Mjau.

Another page...

... from the next book, Athos in America. The page is drawn with a lettering nib that gives a bigger variation in the line, the horizontal lines being wider than the vertical ones. Of the six stories in the collection, I've finished... oh, four and a half. There's still some work left on the fifth, and I will then start the sixth, that is sort of a film noir story.

Charade

Audrey Hepburn's husband is killed. He had stolen some money that now are missing. George Kennedy and James Coburn want the money, so does Walter Matthau and Cary Grant. Who can she trust? Directed by Stanley Donen

It's another film I remember seeing on tv as a kid! But I think it's more than just nostalgia that makes this a great film. I'd say it's the best Hitchcock film not directed by Hitchcock. Hell, even including his films it would be close to the top of the list in my mind. For one thing, Hepburn is more appealing than the cool blondes Hitchcock liked. Donen lets the actors have fun and not simply replicate the storyboards. The Grant taking a shower - with his clothes on! - scene would probabably not have been allowed in a Hitchcock film. I wonder if it was scripted or something Grant came up with. Walter Matthau is very funny in his part. And the climax in the theater is genuinly thrilling. Even after you know the sollution of the mystery it's an entertaining film.

Cover for Mjau Mjau # 10

...which consisted of the story Tell Me Something.

A page...

... from my Dracula story in Almost Silent. I chose to take it out since I was a bit unhappy about it. If it had been included it would have been on page 22.