Why aren’t you a star?
As plans go, Sergei Komarov’s was pretty good and it says
something that the writer/director’s game was – according to some - only fully up
some years later when someone handed his titular star a copy of this film in
the 40’s or 70’s depending on your source. Either way, I’ve no idea what
Mary Pickford thought of the finished film, I’d hope it would have brought back
some very happy memories of her time in Europe with Douglas Fairbanks and also that
it would remind her how absolutely loved she was by millions. It would have
made her laugh no doubt and at her own expense and the sheer ludicrous nature
of the fame she experienced in a uniquely successful way in over twenty years
of filmmaking and beyond.
In 1926 Mary and Douglas came to Moscow as part of a
grand European tour and seeing how rapturously they were greeted, how fetishized
they were as something beyond ordinary humanity, Komarov devised a means of
using this to both shine a light on the nature of this ultra-fame and to
lampoon it. He had no special access to Pickford and Fairbanks just a
collection of newsreels and one crucial sequence in which Mary agreed to perform
a short skit with Igor Ilyinsky at the end of which she kisses him on the cheek;
the moment which makes this film transcend its sources, from meta to better.
As a standalone comedy, A Kiss from Mary Pickford works as a kind of Russia cousin of the lost Merton of the Movies or Souls for Sale, Show People and so many films that are about films. Its humour is slapstick and pointedly surreal, revelling in the magic whilst at the same time making vicious fun of Pickfair mania and the need to not just see stars but to own anything connected to them, a kind of amoral materialism reflective of the current state of capitalist decline...
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| Igor Ilyinsky takes it all in |
It begins with our hero, Goga Palkin (Ilyinsky), a ticket
collector at a cinema, being rejected by his “actress” girlfriend, Dusya
Galkina (the striking Anel Sudakevich) for not being able to hold a candle to
her hero, Douglas Fairbanks. Come back to me when you’re a star she demands
unreasonably, not revealing the auditions she herself failed that morning. Their
quarrel comes after watching Zorro – itself a reminder of Valentino’s The
Eagle, screened earlier in the festival – and Goga makes plaintive
Fairbanks faces, as he wonders how he can possibly compare.
Luckily, even Soviet Moscow has an industry prepared to
train would be film stars and Goga enlists on a programme to test his suitability
to be a star. This course is perhaps unnecessarily rigorous as the latest
reject is hauled out unconscious by an aggressive looking man. Stardom is
clearly not for everyone and clearly makes demands that the average citizen finds
hard to bear… Then he appears before three white coated old men who, naturally,
get him to stand under a cold shower in a swimming costume. He pulls out the
picture of his love to remind himself why this ordeal will be worth it and then
strikes an exhausted Fairbanks pose and smile… is that all there is?
He passes the first test perfectly although he’s only
just keeping it together… then he’s spun around until he disappears, the men
worry he may have been disintegrated and then he has to stand on his head for
long minutes – he cheats by putting his shoes on his hands. The result? A pass
with flying colours – Genuine Certification of Cinematic Ability (Stunts)…
Russia’s Buster Keaton is born… or is he?
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| One for Zorro, Anel Sudakevich |
The pace is unrelenting and there’s some excellent funny
business with the glass of water Goga slips into his pocket… he forgets and
sits down only to realise that there’s water running down his leg. For a few
horrible moments he relives childhood torment.
Soon Goga wanders onto his first film set which, conveniently
enough, seems to be situated right next to the cinema. There is a superb
overhead shot of a studio at work, with two separate scenes being filmed, the
actors dwarfed by the scenery and the technology. The studio was Mezhrabpom-Rus,
now the Gorky Film Studio, where over 20 films, including Aelita, Queen of
Mars were shot.
Goga looks dumb enough to do stunt work and so it transpires
as he’s hefted high up to the rafters for an especially dangerous stunt,
promptly falling asleep 100 feet in the air after the cast and crew below are
distracted by the imminent arrival of two American superstars…
What if we make a Russian Harry Piel out of him?
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| Show people at the Mezhrabpom-Rus |
The producers decide that Goga is a natural comic and that
they can make him into “a Russian Harry Piel”. Who’s that, I hear you cry – me too
– well, Harry was a hugely successful comic actor and director who made over a
hundred films, 72 of which were lost, including most of his silent, in an
allied air raid during the war. He joined the Nazi Party in 1933 and paid the
price with post-war imprisonment never recovering his popularity. He was known
for his explosive comic style and for allegedly doing all his own stunts
(spoiler: he didn’t) but would have been closer to the dafter version of early Keaton/Chaplin
that Ilyinsky presents here.
Mary and Doug arrive and within the film, even watching
now, there’s a thrill in seeing such candid shots of them. Mary’s beautiful smile
is if anything more marked than on screen whilst suntanned Doug looks as fit as
a butcher’s dog as the saying used to go in Stalingrad… Star power shines out as
they wave from a train window, from their hotel and as they arrive as the film
studios. I’m reminded of the time when Doug had to carry his wife on his
shoulders among one crush in London on their honeymoon, even though they are protected,
they feel much closer to the crowds than you’d expect; reality about to crash
their fragile fame.
But Goga walks into the reception and is only concerned
about seeing his love who is far too intent on viewing the royal couple to pay
him any heed. Dusya has been one of a group pursuing the Americans with
wide-eyed fanaticism, moving forward en masse like a plague of cineaste zombies;
the undead, avoiding the light and staring, always staring, in search of a
screen…
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| Douglas and Mary |
When it comes to love scenes, I’m always ready.
Who is that funny little man? Asks Miss Pickford, clearly
with an eye for style. The studio execs ask him to do his stunt for her but he
hides in fear of falling only to reveal himself when Miss Pickford asks if she
can do a love scene with him instead. After seeing only, the fiction and the newsreel
footage it is indeed as surprise to see the two actors together and it must
have caused a sensation in Russia. If Mary wanted to show her support for
Russian film it worked.
And how it works in the film too as Goga himself becomes
a superstar with eager fans chasing him everywhere for just a strip of shirt or
grab from his wig. It’s like George Harrison running from fans in A Hard Day’s
Night or, more pointedly, David Hemmings fighting for Jeff Beck’s guitar in
the 100 Club in Antonioni’s Blow Up; you maybe saw it here first Michelangelo?
Is Goga now too good for Dusya or will he get over himself and his legions of
fans?
As Steven Morrissey once said: Fame, fame, fatal fame,
It can play hideous tricks on the brain…
John Sweeney provided accompaniment and delighted in
every comedic twist and turn in this joyful film that is as much a celebration
of the Muscovite sense of humour as its cinema. John tracked the full range
with accompaniment that was as in tune with Sergei Komarov’s larger purpose as
it was Ilyinsky’s every gurn and pratfall. It is, as John said in his
introduction, the kind of film you fall for… one that is largely unseen but is
further evidence of the strength of Russian comedy and cinematic ideas during
the Twenties.
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| John Sweeney on piano cam! |
Mary and Doug also met with Sergei Eisenstein on their
Moscow trip having helped get his Battleship Potyomkin released in the
US. Fluent in English, Eisenstein took them on a tour of the city and gave them
its history cinematically and otherwise. Mary’s kiss was her contribution to a
film industry that fascinated them and which they hoped to encourage; a glimpse
of the contemporary view of fellow creatives at a time when the Soviet project was
very much in the balance.
You can still catch the weekend programme via the Hippfest
site and Q&As are on the Falkirk Community Trust YouTube channel.
You can still catch up on the weekend programme until tomorrow so better be quick, especially for Louise Brooks in a restored
silent Prix De Beauté (1930) with Stephen Horne score, Marlene in The
Woman Men Yearn For (1929) and Mary Pickford in the above film and the
brilliant southern gothic of Sparrows (1926).
It’s been a joy and I look forward to attending next year’s
festival in person!
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