{"id":9195,"date":"2014-07-10T17:04:46","date_gmt":"2014-07-10T21:04:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/?p=9195"},"modified":"2014-07-10T17:04:46","modified_gmt":"2014-07-10T21:04:46","slug":"are-you-now-or-have-you-ever-been-a-member-of-the-communist-party","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/?p=9195","title":{"rendered":"‘Are you now, or have you ever been a member of the Communist Party?’"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Front1976_BR\"<\/a>Just posted is a review of Twilight Time\u2019s excellent Blu-ray edition of Martin Ritt and Walter Bernstein\u2019s The Front<\/a><\/strong>, a tight little satire on the Hollywood Blacklist which stalled, diverted, and in many cases ruined careers of so-called Communist sympathizers.<\/p>\n

It was a blatant witch hunt in modern times, administered by HUAC (House Un-American Activities Committee) with main point-man Sen. Joseph McCarthy demanding witnesses name-names not to route out actual Reds, but maintain a machine whose existence depended on the appearance of success. If HUAC could publish a steady tally of exposed spies, convictions, and reprimanded Communist sympathizers, the Committee\u2019s employees had guaranteed jobs.<\/p>\n

What The Front <\/strong>also exposes is the fringe businesses that enjoyed some level of protection in hiring out their snooping services to prove, disprove, or make up background checks for potential \/ existing employees by TV and radio networks paranoid that any hint of a Red in their midst would upset their dependence on sponsors.<\/p>\n

Woody Allen is very strong in a more or less dramatic role, and Zero Mostel is quite compelling as a hit comedian forced back to the Borscht Belt clubs at cut rates after he\u2019s dumped from a successful TV gig. Mostel was one of many comedians who worked the clubs in the Catskills, a training ground for new talent and ideas that was documented by Melvut Akkaya and Ron Frank in their 2013 film When Comedy Went to School<\/a><\/strong>.<\/p>\n

There have been several docs and fictional pokes at HUAC (it\u2019s a huge<\/em> subject, especially if one adds the careers of working blacklisted filmmakers and writers, such as the makers of Christ in Concrete<\/strong><\/a>), but two films I\u2019m still waiting to see on DVD are Phillip Saville\u2019s Fellow Traveller <\/strong>(1991) about a U.S. writer working in Britain, and Witch Hunt <\/strong>(1994), Paul Schrader\u2019s sequel to the HBO teleplay Cast a Deadly Spell <\/strong>(1991), mixing magic, witches, politics and persecution.<\/p>\n

Come to think of it, where\u2019s Spell<\/strong> as well?<\/p>\n

Last footnote before I prep tomorrow\u2019s review \u2013 Sage Stallone\u2019s short film Vic<\/strong> (2006) \u2013 is an anecdote from a friend who hired a classmate to film his sister\u2019s wedding back in university days. As the videographer \u00a0(himself a peculiar wit) roved around the guests, pointing the camera at friends & family members, once in a while one could clearly hear the question \u201cAre you now or have you ever been a member of the Communist Party?\u201d<\/p>\n

This isn\u2019t to belittle the wretched witch hunt begun by HUAC, but I admit that on occasion, when I hear the term HUAC, I flash back to the footage of a puzzled guest as he\u2019s asked such a non-traditional wedding question while noshing on an hors d\u2019oeuvre. There may have been an F-bomb in the long-gone outtakes, but we\u2019ll never know.<\/p>\n

Coming next<\/em>: Stallone\u2019s Vic<\/strong> (Grindhouse Releasing), and Blue Movie<\/strong> (Raro Video) from enfant terrible Alberto Cavallone.<\/p>\n

Cheers,<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Mark R. Hasan<\/strong>, Editor
\nKQEK.com<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Review of Twilight Time’s great Blu-ray of The Front (1976), starring Woody Allen + quick thoughts on HUAC + upcoming reviews.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":9196,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false},"categories":[6],"tags":[2562,2563,2880,2557,1536,2877,2879],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/07\/JosephMcCarthy_featured.jpg","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p8nuyW-2oj","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9195"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=9195"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9195\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9198,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9195\/revisions\/9198"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/9196"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=9195"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=9195"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=9195"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}