Ask Mick LaSalle: On Katherine Heigl's success
Dear Mick LaSalle: Why is Katherine Heigl a movie star?
David G. Fink, San Francisco
Dear David G. Fink: Because people like looking at her. That's the common denominator of all movie stars, from Scarlett Johansson to Edward G. Robinson.
Dear Mick: Of the movies that were scripted, cast or came close to production, but were never made, which one would you sell your soul to see?
Dear Ken: I can't say I'd sell my soul or even sublet it metaphorically to see any movie. But I wouldn't mind visiting an alternate universe to see James Toback's biopic about feminist Victoria Woodhull and Max Ophuls' abandoned 1949 project "La duchesse de Langeais." Most of all, I'd like to see the concert film of John Lennon's 1981 world tour. Or maybe archival footage from the Kennedy-Goldwater debates.
Dear Mick LaSalle: I'm delighted that you should mention the engineering skills of Hedy Lamarr. I've been thinking about the role she could have played in American society if she were alive today. I imagine a trajectory extending from "Ecstasy" to Silicon Valley, ending inevitably in her election as California governor or senator. Right?
William Burke, San Francisco
Dear William Burke: That would have been an original experience – to hear someone saying she'll fix the economy by cutting "waste, fraud and abuse" and in an Austrian accent, no less. oh no … wait. We've heard that already.
Hey Mick: You'd think with all the money spent on movies, they'd get the details right. I'm talking about things like empty suitcases flapping around when the actor walks, walking sticks held on the wrong side of the body, and not locking car doors in bad neighborhoods. Or how about this, the actor slices a 2-inch-thick rope with one thrust of a fruit knife? For me, that blows the whole movie.
Hey Dave: But Dave, Dave, Dave – you're watching movies in a way that makes no sense. You're wrecking your pleasure by assuming they're supposed to be real. They're pretend. They are once-upon-a-time, and they require a certain degree of cooperation from the people on the other side of the storybook. do we really want to watch actors fumbling for their keys, or have an action scene lengthened by somebody taking five minutes to carve through a rope? As soon as viewers see the rope and the knife, they know what happens and are ready for the next moment. Movies are not supposed to be real. Their truth is in the emotion, the interaction, the inner conflict – and in your own response. You're getting bogged down in things everybody sees but agrees to ignore.
Autumn Greetings mr. LaSalle: I just watched some 1930s Josephine Baker films from France, including "Zouzou" and "Princess Tam Tam." what do you think of her in these films? did they showcase her talent?
Julian Grant, San Francisco
Autumn Greetings mr. Grant: The few newsreel and archival clips I've seen suggest that Baker's nightclub shows in Paris were a lot more wild and risque (and naked) than anything in these films. so the films are a bit tame, but at least we have them. Had Baker stayed home instead of making a career in Europe, there would have been no starring roles at all. She would have wound up like Fredi Washington (1903-1994), who was also black, also a great dancer and who, on top of that, was gorgeous and a serious actress – but her career never quite happened.
Dear Mick LaSalle: Your columns have decreased in feeling and depth over the past year.
Bill Harmatz, Albany
Dear bill Harmatz: Oh no. not again! Don't tell anybody.
Have a question? ask Mick LaSalle at mlasalle@sfchronicle.com. Include your name and city for publication, and a phone number for verification. Letters may be edited for clarity and length. on SFGate To hear ask Mick LaSalle with commentary, trivia and lots of extras, download his podcast at sfgate.com/podcasts.
This article appeared on page Q – 30 of the San Francisco Chronicle
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