Film Trace Film Trace

We conclude our Camp Cinema season with our eighth episode covering Johnny Guitar (1954) and Imitation of Life (1959).
In our finale, we delve into the origins of Camp Cinema in the 1950s, spotlighting Nicholas Ray's flamboyant western Johnny Guitar and Douglas Sirk's melodramatic Imitation of Life. Johnny Guitar subverts the traditional male bravado typical of most westerns by pitting two powerful women against each other. The visual artistry of Ray and his cinematographer, Harry Stradling, reveals the campy essense of the film with a rich palette of canary yellows, baked terra cottas, and deep azures.
Imitation of Life achieves a similar feat, but with emotional resonance rather than visual flair. During our 1950s season, we explored Todd Haynes' commendable Douglas Sirk hommage, Far From Heaven. But nothing compares to the authentic touch of Sirk himself. Sirk masterfully understood cinema's power over an audience, manipulating emotions with precision in Imitation of Life. Its finale is one of the most emotionally explosive moments ever captured on celluloid. Camp manifest is many forms. Here we have two films that seem diametrically opposed in genre, but both use camp to full effect to elicit a deep response.

We continue our Camp Cinema season in our seventh episode covering The Umbrellas of Cherbourg (1964) and Barbarella (1968)
Special Guest: Manish Mathur, host of the It Pod to Be You, covering romantic comedies from classics to modern hits and everything in between.
French director Jacques Demy embarked on an ambitious project to create a film in which every line was sung. What initially appeared as a gimmicky opera about everyday life evolved into one of the most acclaimed musicals of all time. The film is imbued with vivid color and adorned with enchanting songs, showcasing Demy's profound appreciation for artifice, a hallmark of camp cinema.
In stark contrast to Demy's refined sensibility stands Roger Vadim's audacious science fiction film, Barbarella (1968). Infamous for the wrong reasons, the film features Jane Fonda in the lead role, navigating an incoherent narrative inspired by a French erotic comic. Here, the camp is strikingly naïve, and the collective artistic intentions remain enigmatic and elusive.

We continue our Camp Cinema season in our sixth episode covering The Rocky Horror Picture Show (1975) and The Day of the Locust (1975).
Special Guest: scholar, artist, author, and curator Marisa C. Hayes of the wonderful Afterimages podcast and book series.
The first film discussed needs no introduction, though Dan and Chris could have used one since the Jim Sharman-directed camp classic was a first-watch for both of them. Enter Marisa to help break down why it perhaps took so many years for two Midwest suburban boys to break through its storied midnight movie status and witness its madcap genius. Then, a hard pivot to John Schlesinger's takedown of the Golden Age of Hollywood in all its messy, over-the-top glory. The proto-Babylon isn't fully self-aware of its turgid and grisly nature, though perhaps that's exactly what defines it as an underrated camp gem, though certainly an oddity that lies on the fringes of canon.

We continue our Camp Cinema season in our fifth episode covering Hairspray (1988) and Xanadu (1980)
Special Guest: Gavin Mevius and Louie Rendon from the great Mixed Reviews podcast
John Waters is the prince of camp. We simply had to choose one of his films for our season on Camp Cinema. The lucky winner was Hairspray. While Waters is known for his deft ability to push the boundaries of taste and propriety, Hairspray spins and shakes upon the line of respectability without overly indulging in taboo. This spry wiliness in tone perhaps what makes it his most potent film.
Xanadu on the other hand would never flirts with respectability or taboo. It exists in some liminal space between imagination and reality. Nothing about Xanadu makes any sense, especially the plot. But there is something a bit magical within this technicolor rumpus. Gene Kelly and Olivia Newton-John bring class and warmth to what could have been a real bad trip. Is Xanadu good? The syntax of that question is nonsensical. Camp is post logic, which is where Xanadu lies.

We continue our Camp Cinema season in our fourth episode covering To Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything! Julie Newmar (1995) and Magnolia (1999)
Special Guest: Returning Guest, Rotten Tomato approved film critic, Natasha Alvar from Cultured Vultures
When watching To Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything! Julie Newmar, there is an overriding sense of what could have been. Coming out in the mid 1990s, a surprisingly much more open time in American culture, Wong Foo went to number one at the box office. It was a modest hit, but clearly well received by the general public. If this movie was made today, everyone involved would get more death threats than residuals checks. Culture doesn't always move forward, sometimes it backslides.
Magnolia is a controversial pick for Camp Cinema. To me, it is the paradigm of what Susan Sontag called Naive Camp in her 1964 essays Notes on Camp. Magnolia is a manically ambition film with a passionate and serious tone. Paul Thomas Anderson, like Cameron Crowe in Vanilla Sky, strived to reach the artistic heavens, but all he did was take on a tour of the sad and lonely people of the San Fernando Valley. Chris and Natasha offer some good counterpoints to my stance.

We continue our Camp Cinema season in our third episode covering Sugar and Spice (2001) and Vanilla Sky (2002)
Special Guest: Good friend and frequent guest, Molly
The early Aughts was a bizarre time in American culture. The heady surge of the late 90s into Y2K was quicky benzo'd by 9/11 and the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. Our two selections for the 2000s were written and produced before the big comedown, and they both definitely have a "we can do anything" vibe. Sugar and Spice deftly somersaulted through the byzantine development process at New Line Cinema, who were likely distracted by their massive production of Lord of the Rings trilogy at the time. What could have easily been a teen movie cash-in is a rather spunky, satirical, and fun mess. Does it work? No, but it is sassy enough to not care.
Vanilla Sky is not fun. Here Cameron Crowe's grandiose vision was blinded by his fiery ambition. Coming off his best film, Almost Famous, Crowe decided to tackle a remake of Alejandro Amenábar's 1997 Spanish film Abre Los Ojos. Vanilla Sky does not align with the traditional definition of camp, but it certainly seems to be the bullseye of what Susan Sontag called Naive Camp. It is a film so devoutly serious about something so frivolously stupid.