Maybe the dingo ate your baby.

Seinfeld

2.9: The Stranded

The Premise

George and Elaine are stranded at a party in Long Island, with a disgruntled hostess.

Observational

Another episode that doesn’t quite come together. It has an all-time classic moment (Elaine’s riff on Meryl Streep in A Cry in the Dark) and some reasonablt effective sequences (Kramer’s arrival at the party house, George’s indignation over being short-changed) but it’s front-loaded with all the good material and limps to the finish line. Larry David may well have agreed; he was responsible for delaying its airdate until the third season (it’s in the correct order on the DVD collection).

If George is going to win, he usually has to lose even more resoundingly. The trip to Long Island is at his behest, since he has a chance with work colleague Ava (hearing his apparent enthusiasm over a real estate deal does not compute, it must be said). And her forwardness unsettles him, first resulting in a randomly classical literature-sounding response (“I long for you”) and then desperation (“I can’t perform under pressure”). It gets worse when he realises the repercussions of dating a work colleague (“Every day is a date”) and he reaches the only decision he can in order to end the anxiety (“I have no choice. I’m quitting”). Cue out-of-work George (although his demise comes a couple of episodes later, in spectacular fashion), ripe for material and the introduction of his parents.

If he reverses out of that situation, his approach to dealing with the money he feels is owed is to dig his heels in. He attempts to steal medicine from the same store we saw in the opening (“I have to do this. It’s a matter of honour”) and ends up being arrested. But ending with George and Jerry swapping incarceration stories feels off (maybe if Larry Charles had written this one the exaggeration would play better). His reasoning for his date’s advances is a nicely self-deprecating, however (“I don’t know. Maybe a safe fell on her head”).

Jerry and Elaine’s boredom and frustration at a party where they have nothing in common with those they’re stuck talking to no one to talk to is skilfully sustained from the moment they arrive (“Yeah, this has disaster written all over it”). Jerry’s the one forwarding the anti-social ethos this time (“Have a bunch of strangers treat your house like a hotel room”) and everything goes wrong. Their attempts to signal each other when they get into an awkward conversation never connect, so they have to amuse themselves by taking the piss out of their co-guests. Jerry explains where he gets the inspiration for his material (“I hear a voice”) while Elaine confounds Gwen, who won’t stop talking about her fi-ancé in particularly shrill tones (“Maybe the dingo ate your baby”).

The dingo exchange is a delightful Elaine “crazy” moment, her getting worked up over the wearing of fur less so. Jerry’s “Pendant? Those bastards!” when he eventually does come to Elaine’s aid is gleefully over-the-top. We also hear about “the Code” from Jerry; George gets to take the car because he has scored. The duo’s pain as they attempt to pass conversation while their hostess is on the verge of evicting them is palpable.

So it’s a relief to have Kramer disorganised arrival, at 2am and having knocked on every door in the area (he knows the numbers of the address, just no what order they come in). He peers in through the window, causing the hostess to scream out in horror. And, although he comes to their rescue, since he couldn’t get the top on his convertible up both Elaine and Jerry catch a chill. Following this, Matt Goldman, David and Seinfeld are stuck for how to continue the story and fix on a bit of a stiff.

The Michael Chiklis plotline just doesn’t work. As Steve, the apparently meek and mild host of the party, it’s certainly something different from Chilkis’ work on The Shield, he turns up at Jerry’s apartment to indulge in his own bit of carousing. Even with Kramer around, there’s a dearth of real laughs and it leads to a weak conclusion where Jerry is arrested for solicitation.

Quotable

George: You haven’t won. You may think you’ve won but you haven’t. You know why, because it’s not over. This is not over. I’m not forgetting what’s happening here. You have my ten dollars. I will get it back. It’s all right. It’s not over. I’m going now. Goodbye. I will be back. Ho-ho-hoo.

Man: Where do you get your material?

Jerry: I hear a voice.

Man: What kind of voice?

Jerry: A man’s voice. But he speaks German so I have to get it translated.

Gwen: Ellen, have you seen my fi-ancé? I have lost my fi-ancé, the poor baby.

Elaine: Maybe the dingo ate your baby.

Gwen: What?

Elaine: The dingo ate your baby.

George: That’s a lot of pressure. “Make love to me.” What am I, in the circus? I can’t perform under pressure.

Verdict:

Your Mickey Mouse is one big stupid dope!

Enemy Mine (1985) (SPOILERS) The essential dynamic of Enemy Mine – sworn enemies overcome their differences to become firm friends – was a well-ploughed one when it was made, such that it led to TV Tropes assuming, since edited, that it took its title from an existing phrase (Barry Longyear, author of the 1979 novella, made it up, inspired by the 1961 David Niven film The Best of Enemies ). The Film Yearbook Volume 5 opined that that Wolfgang Petersen’s picture “ lacks the gritty sauciness of Hell in the Pacific”; John Boorman’s WWII film stranded Lee Marvin and Toshiro Mifune on a desert island and had them first duking it out before becoming reluctant bedfellows. Perhaps germanely, both movies were box office flops.

If I do nothing else, I will convince them that Herbert Stempel knows what won the goddam Academy Award for Best goddam Picture of 1955. That’s what I’m going to accomplish.

Quiz Show (1994) (SPOILERS) Quiz Show perfectly encapsulates a certain brand of Best Picture nominee: the staid, respectable, diligent historical episode, a morality tale in response to which the Academy can nod their heads approvingly and discerningly, feeding as it does their own vainglorious self-image about how times and attitudes have changed, in part thanks to their own virtuousness. Robert Redford’s film about the 1950s Twenty-One quiz show scandals is immaculately made, boasts a notable cast and is guided by a strong screenplay from Paul Attanasio (who, on television, had just created the seminal Homicide: Life on the Streets ), but it lacks that something extra that pushes it into truly memorable territory.

Other monks will meet their deaths here. And they too will have blackened fingers. And blackened tongues.

The Name of the Rose (1986) (SPOILERS) Umberto Eco wasn’t awfully impressed by Jean Jacques-Annaud’s adaptation of his novel – or “ palimpsest of Umberto Eco’s novel ” as the opening titles announce – to the extent that he nixed further movie versions of his work. Later, he amended that view, calling it “ a nice movie ”. He also, for balance, labelled The Name of the Rose his worst novel – “ I hate this book and I hope you hate it too ”. Essentially, he was begrudging its renown at the expense of his later “ superior ” novels. I didn’t hate the novel, although I do prefer the movie, probably because I saw it first and it was everything I wanted from a medieval Sherlock Holmes movie set in a monastery and devoted to forbidden books, knowledge and opinions.

Say hello to the Scream Extractor.

Monsters, Inc. (2001) (SPOILERS) I was never the greatest fan of Monsters, Inc. , even before charges began to be levelled regarding its “true” subtext. I didn’t much care for the characters, and I particularly didn’t like the way Pixar’s directors injected their own parenting/ childhood nostalgia into their plots. Something that just seems to go on with their fare ad infinitum. Which means the Pixars I preferred tended to be the Brad Bird ones. You know, the alleged objectivist. Now, though, we learn Pixar has always been about the adrenochrome, so there’s no going back…

No one can be told what the Matrix is. You have to see it for yourself.

The Matrix (1999) (SPOILERS) Twenty years on, and the articles are on the defining nature of The Matrix are piling up, most of them touching on how its world has become a reality, or maybe always was one. At the time, its premise was engaging enough, but it was the sum total of the package that cast a spell – the bullet time, the fashions, the soundtrack, the comic book-as-live-action framing and styling – not to mention it being probably the first movie to embrace and reflect the burgeoning Internet ( Hackers doesn’t really count), and subsequently to really ride the crest of the DVD boom wave. And now? Now it’s still really, really good.

All the world will be your enemy, Prince with a Thousand Enemies.

Watership Down (1978) (SPOILERS) I only read Watership Down recently, despite having loved the film from the first, and I was immediately impressed with how faithful, albeit inevitably compacted, Martin Rosen’s adaptation is. It manages to translate the lyrical, mythic and metaphysical qualities of Richard Adams’ novel without succumbing to dumbing down or the urge to cater for a broader or younger audience. It may be true that parents are the ones who get most concerned over the more disturbing elements of the picture but, given the maturity of the content, it remains a surprise that, as with 2001: A Space Odyssey (which may on the face of it seem like an odd bedfellow), this doesn’t garner a PG certificate. As the makers noted, Watership Down is at least in part an Exodus story, but the biblical implications extend beyond Hazel merely leading his fluffle to the titular promised land. There is a prevalent spiritual dimension to this rabbit universe, one very much

In a few moments, you will have an experience that will seem completely real. It will be the result of your subconscious fears transformed into your conscious awareness.

Brainstorm (1983) (SPOILERS) Might Brainstorm have been the next big thing – a ground-breaking, game-changing cinematic spectacle that had as far reaching consequences as Star Wars (special effects) or Avatar (3D) – if only Douglas Trumbull had been allowed to persevere with his patented “Showscan” process (70mm film photographed and projected at 60 frames per second)? I suspect not; one only has to look at the not-so-far-removed experiment of Ang Lee with Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk , and how that went down like a bag of cold sick, to doubt that any innovation will necessarily catch on (although Trumbull at least had a narrative hinge on which to turn his “more real than real” imagery, whereas Lee’s pretty much boiled down to “because it was there”). Brainstorm ’s story is, though, like its title, possibly too cerebral, too much concerned with the consciousness and touting too little of the cloyingly affirmative that Bruce Rubin inevitably brings to his screenplays. T

Piece by piece, the camel enters the couscous.

The Forgiven (2021) (SPOILERS) By this point, the differences between filmmaker John Michael McDonagh and his younger brother, filmmaker and playwright Martin McDonagh, are fairly clearly established. Both wear badges of irreverence and provocation in their writing, and a willingness to tackle – or take pot-shots – at bigger issues, ones that may find them dangling their toes in hot water. But Martin receives the lion’s share of the critical attention, while John is generally recognised as the slightly lesser light. Sure, some might mistake Seven Psychopaths for a John movie, and Calvary for a Martin one, but there’s a more flagrant sense of attention seeking in John’s work, and concomitantly less substance. The Forgiven is clearly aiming more in the expressly substantial vein of John’s earlier Calvary, but it ultimately bears the same kind of issues in delivery.

He tasks me. He tasks me, and I shall have him.

Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan (1982) (SPOILERS) I don’t love Star Trek , but I do love Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan . That probably isn’t just me, but a common refrain of many a non-devotee of the series. Although, it used to apply to The Voyage Home (the funny one, with the whales, the Star Trek even the target audience for Three Men and a Baby could enjoy). Unfortunately, its high regard has also become the desperate, self-destructive, song-and-verse, be-all-and-end-all of the overlords of the franchise itself, in whichever iteration, it seems. This is understandable to an extent, as Khan is that rare movie sequel made to transcendent effect on almost every level, and one that stands the test of time every bit as well (better, even) as when it was first unveiled.

Now In Full Color, with a Happier Ending

Search This Blog