So, let’s get back on track here with “365 Degrees,” folks,
whattaya say? We spent some time off here in “365 Degree-ville” but the holiday
is over and we got movies to talk about!
Now, I know you have been sitting there, thinking, “Now, how
is he gonna link anything off of Army of Darkness?”
I must confess, my first thought was to go easy and pull one
of Bruce Campbell’s cameos from his buddy Sam Raimi’s movies – Darkman being a
personal favorite – but this was just too… predictable. But then I remembered
another connection possibility. And it led to one of my favorite “nobody has a
clue what this movie is” movies. Therefore, let me take you on a journey to a
fascinating movie called Grace of My Heart.
Edna Buxton (Illeana Douglas) is a steel heiress who wants
to be a singer. She enters a local contest, where she plans on singing “You’ll
Never Walk Alone,” but, backstage, she meets a young blues singer named Doris
Shelley (Jennifer Leigh Warren), who is belting the hell out of a song called “The
Blues Ain’t Nothin’ (But a Woman Cryin’ ‘Bout Her Man)”. Doris convinces Edna
to follow her heart and sing a song she really feels, rather than something
safe. Edna does, singing “Hey There”, and wins the contest. She spends her
prize money by cutting a demo record of her first original song, “In Another
World.” Record producer Joel Milner (John Turturro) likes the record but tells
her, bluntly, that she has no chance of making it because of her name, her
background, and her gender. “Nobody wants a woman solo singer,” he tells her.
He buys her record, retools it for a male group, and it becomes a hit. Milner
gives Edna a new name, Denise Waverly, a fictional background as a blue-collar
girl, and installs her in New York’s famous Brill Building, where songwriting
was the name of the game for most of the late 50’s and into the 60’s.
Denise starts cranking out hits, getting little credit, but
making a name for herself among the nototiously male universe that was
songwriting. Denise finds herself involved with an egotistical songwriter (Eric
Stolz), who constantly tells her that her work is substandard, yet still, her
songs are hits while his are not. They marry, but she soon finds out her
husband is more interested in other women than he is his career, and she leaves
him, albeit with their child.
When the British Invasion hits and shuts down the Brill
Building, Milner introduces Denise to Jay Phillips (Matt Dillon), the lead
singer of a hot surf-rock group and pushes her to finally be a singer in her
own right. Jay agrees to produce her work, and she records “God Give Me
Strength,” a song she wrote that has strong personal meaning for her. The
record flops, but she and Jay become an item. Jay’s drug use and creative
genius alienate him from the rest of his group, and he isolates himself from
the world, trying to produce the music he hears in her head. When Jay’s drug
use becomes too much for Denise to bear, she leaves him alone. Jay commits
suicide by wandering into the ocean and drowning himself.
Denise falls apart, blaming herself for Jay’s death, and
takes her family and her old friend, Doris, to a hippie commune to fade away.
Milner tracks her down, finally, and in
fit of pique, goes off on her for allowing herself to be manipulated by
men her whole life, including Milner himself. He jabs at her for jumping from
father figure to father figure, down to the guru of the commune. Finally, his
jabs hit home, and Denise breaks, raging and crying, holding onto Milner for
dear life as he smiles and comforts her, telling her, “Now, then… we got to
your heart finally…”
Milner takes her home, and, in the final scene, we see her
in the studio, recording and producing her own album, titled “Grace of My
Heart,” the title of the song she wrote long ago, from her heart.
Now, if any of this sounds remotely familiar, it should. It
has never been made official, of course,
but Grace is a thinly-disguised biopic of Carole King, the incredible
songwriter who made her name in the Brill Building writing songs for many
years, for groups ranging from The Ronettes to The Monkees, until she finally
got the chance to produce her own songs for her own album, after being told for
years that her voice was too “rough,” that her songs were too “personal,” and
that she was not pretty enough to be a solo artist. That album became Tapestry, one of the best albums ever made (and before you challenge me on that, sit down
and actually LISTEN to it – don’t put it on as background music while you clean
house or cook, but sit and LISTEN TO IT… then challenge me… and you will lose…
).
Also, as fictional characters in this movie, you see Brian
Wilson, in the form of Matt Dillon’s Jay Phillips and Leslie Gore, in the form
of Bridget Fonda (who is our connection to Army of Darkness), as she plays a character
named Kelly Porter. Phillips’ drug use and genius mirror Wilson’s long, dark
journey to create Pet Sounds, an album that has to be heard to be fully
appreciated. I have never really been a fan of Dillon, when it comes to his movies. He is very hit or miss. But director Allison Anders gets one hell of a performance out of him here. Watch the scene when Denise first sings her song "Grace of My Heart" for him. At the start, he is very put out because he really does not believe in Denise, but, as she sings the song, he begins to realize just how personal, and painful, the song is for her, and how brave it was to put that much of herself into words and music. He says very little in the scene, but his eyes, his movements, become a three-minute acting class, lesson being, "How to Act Like You're Witnessing a Miracle."
The character of Kelly Porter is a closeted lesbian, miserable in
her world of secrets because, if she was true to herself, in the early 60’s,
her career as a singer would have been ruined. When she confesses her secret to
Denise, Denise writes a song for her that, while becoming a hit, is a beautiful
nod to Porter’s true love, although it can be interpreted as being sung for a
male suitor. Denise and Kelly form a bond as a result of this, and, in real
life, Leslie Gore wrote several of the songs on the soundtrack for this film. 
I was lucky to even see this film the first time I saw it.
It was a literal accident, occurring because I flipped the channel to one of
the, what, 200 channels HBO has now, and caught Turturro’s name in the credits.
Generally, if Turturro is in a movie, I will watch it (at least, I would before
he turned up in the damn Transformers movies.. now, I read up on what movies he
is in before I commit my hearing loss to Michael Bay-version of Turturro movies…).
But, damn, I was hooked from the moment I settled in and realized it was about
music from the 60’s. I love classic rock, especially from the era of Brill
Building-genesis music. They did so much with so very little, compared to
computerized, vocal-changed, jacked-up bullshit that is the current state of
most music today. The attitude then was simple – put singers in front of
microphones, put six or seven musicians in the studio, and let them find their
way to perfection. If it took twenty takes, so be it. Producers were sliding
levels in the booth, finding the best sound from every note, and setting the
tone for each song as they came. And it was brilliant stuff. Absolutely
brilliant...
A few years ago, I was thrilled when Carole King’s music
finally became accepted as genius, and Broadway welcomed King as a performer to
be recognized when Beautiful: The Carole King Musical hit the stage. Her body
of work, solo and with writing partners like Phil Spector (pre-insane version),
Gerry Goffin, Cynthia Weil, and Barry Mann, among others, reached a new
audience, and King finally got her due in another generation of fans.
Take a couple of hours and watch Grace of My Heart. If you
still have any doubts, give these two songs a listen. Written by Burt Bacharach
and Elvis Costello, the first is a thing of beauty. Kristen Vigard does the actual
singing, but Douglas sells the words like few could. Listen to the two songs I
have included here and tell me you are not moved by them.
I have also included Elvis Costello’s own version of “God Give Me Strength.” I have been a fan of Costello’s for years, but nothing he has
done has ever grabbed me and shook me to my soul like this version of the song.
I have lived this song, and, in some ways, I continue to live it. And it is not
often I can say this about a song written for a movie. Screw that damned Titanic
song to hell… THIS is how a song is supposed to touch your soul…
And for the record,
don’t let anyone tell you women are not good film directors. Allison Anders
cast this thing brilliantly, and Douglas, Turturro, and Damon have never been
better than they are here. You may not have ever heard of Grace of My Heart
before now, but I promise you, the movie and the music will stay with you for a
long time…
Ive loved that version of God Give me strength for many years now.
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