More often than not, people generally don't appreciate it when somebody goes all Ingmar Bergman on their asses. And really, who can blame them? Don't people have enough problems these days, what with the financial markets imploding, skyrocketing food prices, and the Palin family? Who really wants existential despair or contemplation on the meaning of death? Worse, who wants it when it's served up by Larry Buchanan?
Many directors have gone all Ingmar Bergman on our asses before. There was actually a time when it wasn't all that uncommon, that is to say, the 1970s, when there were also plenty of reasons to be bummed out. Woody Allen used satire to soften the edges in Love and Death, but no one could deny that he was still going all Ingmar Bergman on at least some of our asses. Larry, in contrast, saw no need to sugar coat our inevitable mortality when he cooked up Strawberries Need Rain. Because while Woody Allen used laughter to make our deaths more palatable, Larry Buchanan used a spatula, smeared with vegetable oil, maybe with some burnt residue on the edge from some sausages that had to be scraped from a cast iron skillet. It was Larry's refusal to take steel wool and detergent to that spatula prior to serving up my eggs that I most respected in the man. And that held true whether those eggs were over easy, scrambled, or fried with broken yolks, such that they didn't ooze onto the adjacent toast, muffin, or bagel.
That's not to say there aren't obvious parallels between Woody Allen and Larry Buchanan, even beyond their Bergman influence. Consider that both of their surnames end with 'n'. And for that matter, so does Bergman's. The skeptics among you may write that off as mere coincidence, but consider that their first names both end with 'y' and have five letters. Oh sure, "Ingmar" has six letters and ends with 'r', but that's to be expected, if you know anything about Nordic mythology, as I obviously do. Do you see my point? Is that your doubt I see receding like a panoramic Swedish sunset?
Okay, maybe the comparison isn't perfect. For example, Buchanan had no idea how to write a coherent script, keep his viewers in a non-comatose state, or use elementary lighting techniques to keep his films from looking like a hunt for jarred tomato preserves in grandma's basement, but isn't that just nitpicking? And didn't grandpa sometimes remember to replace that basement light bulb? And I'll admit that, while Allen is a non-practicing Jew with a reputation for nurturing enough neuroses to put the offspring of a dozen psychiatrists through grad school at NYU, Buchanan came from East Texas Baptist stock, and channeled his neuroses more creatively. Woody Allen never would have suggested that Richard Nixon personally ordered the murders of Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, and Jim Morrisson. But Buchanan did this proudly, providing no explanation for why I should not have wanted Jim Morrisson to be killed. Larry connected the dots, even when those dots couldn't have mattered less. And anything that saves me time I can certainly appreciate.
Perhaps more importantly, while Allen often skews his Bergman influences toward Chaplin or The Marx Brothers, Larry opted for more of a Harry Novak aroma, with loads of gratuitous sex, nudity, and heaving mammaries. The mammaries of note in Strawberries Need Rain are provided by Monica Gayle, a soft core porn actress noted for her appearances in films like Switchblade Sisters and The Erotic Adventures of Pinocchio. The opening sequence provides a generous view of Monica's massive, flopping casabas, as she skinny dips in a river while a guy whacks off in the bushes. Right out of the gate, Larry is giving Ingmar a run for his krona. Yumpin' Yiminy! Is there room for one more submission at Cannes?
After heading back to the farm, Monica notices a guy with a black robe and a scythe approaching the house, obviously looking for a chess opponent. Unfortunately, chess is a little beyond Monica's reach, so the reaper chases her around for a little while before realizing that she's "special." What qualifies her as "special" isn't spelled out, but I can only assume he's caught view of the aforementioned casabas through Monica's cow milking dress. In a display of unprecedented magnanimity, Father Time grants her one more day on earth to allow her to find a guy she can mount to achieve an orgasm. No doubt a lesser endowed woman wouldn't receive the same consideration, and rightfully so. What follows is Larry's melding of Goldilocks, The Seventh Seal, and The Pigkeeper's Daughter, if you substitute sexual promiscuity for chess, and the emissions of a pull string toy for the faintest glimmer of interesting dialogue.
First stop is the house of the guy who was jacking off in the bushes when Monica was skinny dipping. His name is Franz. He's the obvious choice, since nothing turns on women more than masturbating voyeurs. Turns out he's in bed looking at girlie magazines with a flashlight and licking the pictures. What luck! He's already fluffed! Problem is, he's awfully shy. Go get a beer, because what follows is about fifteen time stopping minutes of "sexual tension," Buchanan style. The poignancy is given a boost by actors who look 25 pretending to be pubescent teens. Eventually, Monica takes off her top and triggers a humiliating premature ejaculation from Franz. Oops. Good thing Father Time gave her a full day to get laid. Or maybe not.
The next morning, Monica does some shopping in town, plays on a swing set and listens to a Texas polka band in the park. Then she meets Bruno. He's a biker. He wears sunglasses and has hair like Burton Cummings. Not that there's anything wrong with that, but there's something about Bruno that seems unsavory. At first she doesn't want to go for a ride with him. But once he explains that cows are giving milk and sheep are eating grass and that it's a beautiful day, she decides, what the hell. She's going to be dead tomorrow, so saddling up for a ride on Bruno's one eyed trouser snake might be just the ticket. So off they go, accompanied by a Paul Mauriatesque arrangement of the movie's insipid title theme. Stopping in the country by a mill, their foreplay is heightened with provocative exchanges such as this one, when Monica dips her hand in a creek:
The water. It goes on and on forever.
What?
The water, it just goes on and never stops, does it?
I don't know. I don't suppose. Did you ever see the inside of a mill?
Not surprisingly, Monica has never seen the inside of a mill. Bruno wants to show it to her. Unfortunately, Bruno likes raping women in the mill and beating them with leater straps. Things turn a little sour and Monica has to run away. Bruno tries to run her down on his bike, but Father Time steps in and decapitates him with his scythe. He warns Monica about men who have hair like Burton Cummings, then sends her off on her next adventure. But first, we're treated to another song as she skips through a field, spins around with her arms outstretched, and plucks flowers. It's folksy, it's whimsical, it smells like Judy Collins, and it could tear the skin off a hamster:
Yellow and green and blue, are they colors, or are they feelings?
Or could they be tomorrow's painted memories stealing through?
Yellow and green and blue.
I'm jealous of yellow's daffodils. I'm jealous of the golden sun. etc...
With the film's runtime successfully extended, Goldilocks is off for her third slutty encounter. Golly, do you suppose it'll work out? This time, she happens across her old school teacher. He's sitting by a pond reading Don Quixote. They talk. She refers to the pond as a lake:
Did I hear you call that pond a lake?
Yes, it is a lake. Sometimes it's an ocean. It's whatever I want it to be.
You remind me of a certain gentleman I know.
Who's that?
Don Quixote.
Can you feel the magic? They laugh. They love. They share their feelings. They feed each other strawberries. They run laughing in the rain. They sit by a fireplace. They fuck. And it all seems like an eternity, even though it's really no longer than a Keith Emerson solo or a colonoscopy.
Monica returns to the farm, realizing she is now fulfilled and can confront death with no regrets. But Father Time has a surprise for her. He came for only one soul, and now there are two! Yes, you guessed it, it's a glorious, Phyllis Schlafly inspired dénouement, wherein Monica has earned the right to live by serving as a semen receptacle to anything possessing sideburns, functioning testicles, and a pulse.
Life. What a beautiful choice!
She tilts her smiling face toward the warm sun, a freeze frame captures her reproductive ecstasy for the ages, and the title theme envelopes her, like a quinoa recipe demonstration at an organic grocery:
Bluebirds need wings and a dream needs a dreamer.
Cornfields need golden grain.
And I need love like the dawn needs the sunrise.
And strawberries need rain.
Butterflies need to be free or they never will fly
And they'll die.
Apples need autumn like April needs springtime
Summer, a shady lane.
I need to love to be young to be living
Like strawberries, strawberries need rain.
No comments