1996, the best year in movie history, pt. 45: Kansas City
To get Robert Altman’s Kansas City, you have to get its references to 1930s pop culture:
The pop culture references are hardly obscure, but I’m insufficiently familiar with them. Harlow, especially, was influential; but of her movies, I’ve only seen City Lights (and I had no idea she was in it). Those who wish for a thematic overview of Kansas City had better consult Roger Ebert, who describes Jennifer Jason Leigh’s performance as a kind of jazz riff on Harlow.
The plot is fairly straightforward, although, as in other movies directed by Altman, there are several linked stories. The main story involves the kidnapping of Carolyn (Miranda Richardson), a politician’s wife, by a thief’s wife named Blondie (Leigh). Blondie’s speech, mannerisms, and appearance are copied from the movies she watches. In one amusing sequence, Blondie takes Carolyn to the cinema to view a Jean Harlow picture. Later they debate whether Harlow is “cheap” (low-class). Blondie is shocked that Carolyn should think so.
Blondie: “Her father was a dentist, Dr. Carpenter.”
Carolyn: “Dentist? Doctor? Carpenter?”
Carolyn is pretty loopy because she uses laudanum. Ebert focuses on Leigh’s performance, but I was equally taken with Richardson. She is playing one of Altman’s recurring types, a woman who makes herself seem dumber than she is.
When Blondie first enters Carolyn’s house, Carolyn is in her nightgown, with white cream all over her face. This is intercut with a flashback in which Johnny (Dermot Mulroney), Blondie’s husband, commits a robbery wearing blackface. He provokes the ire of the local Black crime boss, Seldom Seen (Harry Belafonte). Seen has Johnny captured and brought to his club. There, all night and the next day, he subjects Johnny to a lecture that is menacing, grimly humorous, and poignant, all at the same time. Meanwhile, they are serenaded by Seen’s army of jazz musicians.
Seen has a great deal to say about race relations. How well does Johnny listen? Late in the movie, he makes an appeal to Seen that is calculated to flatter; instead, it betrays that his attitude is fundamentally the same as when he put on blackface to rob one of Seen’s customers.
Seen talks and talks. He talks because he is powerful. On the other hand, several Black women in the movie say little but imply a great deal. “Nobody ever asks me,” one of them has to keep telling Blondie when Blondie tries to swear her to secrecy.
As in every Altman movie, social commentary is sprinkled in deftly, with plenty of neat little jokes and sight gags. One of Altman’s favorite techniques is to end a scene by zooming in upon a meaningful prop. And, as in Nashville, the social commentary has music to go along with it.
Samuel loved the jazz. He sat in his highchair eating his breakfast, kicking along with the music.
- Amos ’n’ Andy (the radio show)
- Blondie (the daily comic strip)
- Jean Harlow (the actress)
The pop culture references are hardly obscure, but I’m insufficiently familiar with them. Harlow, especially, was influential; but of her movies, I’ve only seen City Lights (and I had no idea she was in it). Those who wish for a thematic overview of Kansas City had better consult Roger Ebert, who describes Jennifer Jason Leigh’s performance as a kind of jazz riff on Harlow.
The plot is fairly straightforward, although, as in other movies directed by Altman, there are several linked stories. The main story involves the kidnapping of Carolyn (Miranda Richardson), a politician’s wife, by a thief’s wife named Blondie (Leigh). Blondie’s speech, mannerisms, and appearance are copied from the movies she watches. In one amusing sequence, Blondie takes Carolyn to the cinema to view a Jean Harlow picture. Later they debate whether Harlow is “cheap” (low-class). Blondie is shocked that Carolyn should think so.
Blondie: “Her father was a dentist, Dr. Carpenter.”
Carolyn: “Dentist? Doctor? Carpenter?”
Carolyn is pretty loopy because she uses laudanum. Ebert focuses on Leigh’s performance, but I was equally taken with Richardson. She is playing one of Altman’s recurring types, a woman who makes herself seem dumber than she is.
When Blondie first enters Carolyn’s house, Carolyn is in her nightgown, with white cream all over her face. This is intercut with a flashback in which Johnny (Dermot Mulroney), Blondie’s husband, commits a robbery wearing blackface. He provokes the ire of the local Black crime boss, Seldom Seen (Harry Belafonte). Seen has Johnny captured and brought to his club. There, all night and the next day, he subjects Johnny to a lecture that is menacing, grimly humorous, and poignant, all at the same time. Meanwhile, they are serenaded by Seen’s army of jazz musicians.
Seen has a great deal to say about race relations. How well does Johnny listen? Late in the movie, he makes an appeal to Seen that is calculated to flatter; instead, it betrays that his attitude is fundamentally the same as when he put on blackface to rob one of Seen’s customers.
Seen talks and talks. He talks because he is powerful. On the other hand, several Black women in the movie say little but imply a great deal. “Nobody ever asks me,” one of them has to keep telling Blondie when Blondie tries to swear her to secrecy.
As in every Altman movie, social commentary is sprinkled in deftly, with plenty of neat little jokes and sight gags. One of Altman’s favorite techniques is to end a scene by zooming in upon a meaningful prop. And, as in Nashville, the social commentary has music to go along with it.
Samuel loved the jazz. He sat in his highchair eating his breakfast, kicking along with the music.
