Jayne Mansfield's car
| Movie | |
|---|---|
| Original title | Jayne Mansfield's car |
| Country of production | Russia , USA |
| original language | English |
| Publishing year | 2012 |
| length | 122 minutes |
| Rod | |
| Director | Billy Bob Thornton |
| script | Billy Bob Thornton, Tom Epperson |
| production | Alexander Rodnjanski , Geyer Kosinski |
| music | Owen Easterling Hatfield |
| camera | Barry Markowitz |
| cut | Lauren Zuckerman |
| occupation | |
| |
Jayne Mansfield's Car is a feature film by the US director and actor Billy Bob Thornton from the year 2012 . The tragicomedy, for which Thornton wrote the script together with Tom Epperson and also has one of the leading roles, was produced by the Russian Alexander Rodnjanski and the American Geyer Kosinski . The film is set towards the end of the 1960s and is about two families from the USA and Great Britain who meet after the death of their mother.
The film premiered on February 13, 2012 in the competition at the 62nd Berlinale .
action
Morrison, Alabama , in 1969: The wealthy Southern Patriarch Jim Caldwell found out by telephone of the death of his ex-wife Naomi and her desired burial at home. Naomi had her emotionally cold husband and their children Jim Jr. ("Jimbo"), Skip, Carroll and Donna left many years ago because of the Englishman Kingsley Bedford, whom she met on a trip to Europe. Jimbo and Donna are now married and have children. Like their father, Skip and Carroll took active part in acts of war as pilots and paramedics and came back traumatized. The body of the childish Skip, who loves cars and airplanes, is disfigured by burns, while Carroll, an aged hippie, indulges in drugs and protests against the Vietnam War . After a demonstration he had initiated in the small town, Carroll was arrested and insulted by his father as a “traitor”.
At their mother's funeral, the Caldwells meet Naomi's second husband, Kingsley Bedford, at their country estate, who is accompanied by his children, Phillip and Camilla. While Donna is tinkering with the divorced Phillip, Skip tries in his direct way to win over the attractive Camilla, which he succeeds. When Bedford fell weak at Naomi's funeral, the British family involuntarily extended their stay. Caldwell and Bedford, both of whom romanticize their time in World War I , become friends. Caldwell introduces him to his interest in traffic accidents and they both tour actress Jayne Mansfield's wrecked vehicle on display in town . Donna, unhappy in her marriage, sleeps with Phillip, who, to his father's disappointment, spent World War II as a prisoner of war with the Japanese. An attempt Skips to approach his father fails when he appears with his war medals pinned to his bare chest.
A joint hunting expedition by Caldwell and Bedford gets out of hand after Caldwell ingests an LSD tablet secretly placed in the iced tea by his grandson . Intoxicated, he thinks he recognizes the German enemy from the war in Bedford and later jumps half-naked into a river. The incident, however, goes off lightly. Later, Carroll finds his old war-time letter in his father's wet wallet, in which he once confided in him. Old Bedford and Philip make up before they go back to England. Jimbo, Skip and Carroll also get closer, while Carroll's 18-year-old son Mickey volunteers for the Vietnam War to accompany the grandson of the black housekeeper.
History of origin
Jayne Mansfield's Car is Billy Bob Thornton's fourth feature film. The script, which the American wrote together with Tom Epperson , is of autobiographical origin. Thornton's Irish-born father had served in the Korean War himself and took his children to traffic accident sites. Thornton says he never had any real conversation with his father, which is why he is still vying for the acceptance and approval of older men. Thornton named the "romantic side of the [war] tragedy" and the "lack of communication" as the main themes of the film. The Russian film producer Alexander Rodnjanski, who had received the script from an American journalist, gave Thornton a free hand in the project, including choosing the actors. He cast Robert Duvall in the role of the Southern Patriarch, who was Thornton's mentor and father figure until the 1980s.
The shooting took place in summer 2011 in Cedartown and Covington ( Georgia ).
Reviews
Verena Lueken ( Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung ) praised the performance by Robert Duvall. He played "with a bravado, a chutzpah, a joke and a physical gruffness, as if every scene were a boxing match that he wanted to win before he laughed and smacked the other person on the shoulders" , says Lueken, who " hit something a lot of design ” in the 1960s film. Daniel Kothenschulte ( Frankfurter Rundschau ) praised Thornton's screenplay, which “ breaks a lance for the generation of the fathers of the hippies” and shows “the inarticulate suffering of traumatized war veterans” . He drew comparisons to Vincente Minnelli's melodrama Damn them all and referred to the film's "gorgeously comical twists and turns" . According to Barbara Schweizerhof ( die tageszeitung ), the film feels “like new” due to its unevenness, unpolishedness and imbalance and ends up “with a dreamlike security right between sentimentality and feel-good movie” . The portrayal of Robert Duvall gave them price opportunities.
Justin Chang of US trade journal Daily Variety noted that the script felt like it was adapted from a previously published novel or "side play" by Tennessee Williams . The acting ensemble was "excellent" , but the film had to try to reach an audience. The anticipated feud between the two families would never materialize, while the scene in which Skip Camilla tells about the origin of his burns is one of the strongest of Jane Mansfield's Car . Especially Duvall likes his role, while the excellent Katherine LaNasa and Frances O'Connor are neglected in the male-dominated story. The camera work is reminiscent of the works of Gordon Willis in the mid-1970s. Mark Adams from the British film magazine Screen International gave a similar review of Jayne Mansfield's Car , who also doubted whether the film could reach a large audience. The film "rush" with its story and, because of its many characters, could have developed better as a television series. The little space allowed for the female figures was also addressed. Robert Duvall and John Hurt would impress in the roles of heads of families.
Web links
- Datasheet at berlinale.de
- Jayne Mansfield's Car in the Internet Movie Database (English)
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b Video of the Berlinale press conference , February 13, 2012 (36:00 min ff .; accessed on February 14, 2012).
- ↑ Video of the Berlinale press conference , February 13, 2012 (10:00 p.m. ff .; accessed on February 14, 2012).
- ↑ Video of the Berlinale press conference , February 13, 2012 (27:00 min. Ff .; accessed on February 14, 2012).
- ↑ Video of the Berlinale press conference , February 13, 2012 (4:00 p.m. ff .; accessed on February 14, 2012).
- ↑ Billy Bob Thornton to film in Covington ( Memento of the original from February 5, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. at covnews.com, July 6, 2011 (accessed February 14, 2012).
- ↑ Lueken, Verena: Among soldiers: "Jayne Mansfield's Car" . In: Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung , February 14, 2012, No. 38, p. 31.
- ↑ Kothenschulte, Daniel: The truth in dented metal . In: Frankfurter Rundschau , February 14, 2012, p. 32.
- ↑ Schweizerhof, Barbara: The green grass of Alabama . In: the daily newspaper , February 14, 2012, p. 28.
- ↑ Chang, Justin: Jane Mansfield's Car . In: Daily Variety , February 14, 2012, p. 8.
- ^ Adams, Mark: Jayne Mansfield's Car at screendaily.com, February 14, 2012 (accessed February 15, 2012).
