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BUTTERKNIFE 7: Complicated Mazes

After the jump, you’ll find the final episode of Joe Swanberg’s webseries Butterknife, starring Mary Bronstein, Ronnie Bronstein and Craig Zobel (Great World of Sound). Above, you’ll find the penultimate episode, which premiered on butterknife.spout.com last week, but in the haze of SXSW, failed to make it to the blog. Also after the jump, you’ll find a full episode guide, with a bit of where-are-they-now info on Butterknife’s illustrious stars and guest stars. To comment on the episodes, check out the Butterknife discussion page at Spout.com.

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Under discussion:

Far and Away  (1992)

The Lady from Shanghai  (1948)

The Devil's Own  (1997)

The Jackal  (1997)

Happy St. Patty’s Day! Screenhead has a decent but disappointingly short list of the Best and Worst Irish Accents in Cinema. I can’t really disagree with any of the three choices on either side of the fence (despite my devotion to Samantha Morton’s acting talents, bad accent or not), but I must gang up with the commenters in addressing some major exclusions in the worst category. Certainly Tom Cruise in Far and Away, yes Richard Gere in The Jackal, definitely the unmentioned Brad Pitt in The Devil’s Own.

But I most agree with comment #7 that Orson Welles in The Lady from Shanghai, which I just saw for the first time a few weeks ago, has given us the worst fake Irish accent of all time. Maybe it’s not the most inaccurate, though it is surely the most annoying. It’s so awful it’s driving me to drink just thinking about it. Take a listen to the narration in the video above to hear it for yourself. By the way, it might go down a bit easier with the clip I’ve chosen, as it features some really bad colorization that mutes Charles Lawton’s otherwise stunning cinematography. Watched as the film should be watched, though, Welles’ voice is more distinct, intrusive and offensive. It really makes a should-be-great film unwatchable save for in an academic setting.

Anyway, now that I’ve possibly ruined your holiday, let me ask this: are Irish accents the most faked in cinema? I figure a general British accent is actually more faked. So what is it about the Irish accent that gets more attention when faked? Is it more difficult? Is it more obvious to the ear when done badly? Is it just so notable because every March 17 we have to suffer some co-worker or friend attempting one for laughs?

Under discussion:

The Night James Brown Saved Boston  (2008)

For those of you who don’t know, in the wake of the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., a series of race riots broke out in major cities all over America. On one night in April of 1968, James Brown put on a show at the Boston Gardens. The televised broadcast of his performance is said to have kept the streets quiet that evening, giving citizens a distraction from looting and unifying the city in peaceful memorial to one of history’s great professors of peace itself. In his new documentary for VH1, director David Leaf wanders around the happenings of that evening, retelling the story of how Brown became a savior to the people of Beantown.

It’s hard not to think of The Night James Brown Saved Boston as failing on many levels. It’s trite, pandering and not terribly informative. What could be a fascinating account of a legendary concert turns into kind of a mess when Leaf tries to grasp too much extra James Brown history within the 1 hour plus running time. Can you really blame him? He can’t really seem to make one of the most electric stage performances of all time come alive with his bland cinematic rhetoric. The pieces of the concert itself that are in there are overrun by incredibly run of the mill interviews by important figures of the time (Rev. Al Sharpton comes to mind) explaining what’s happening in the footage instead of letting it speak for itself.

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