Bird of Paradise ('32)

encounters w pre-code hollywood movies have been small bets with big payouts

the movies tend to be fast and tight,

sprawling narrative arcs in sub-90mins

still in the fast lane, eighty years later

bird of paradise is 1:22.35minutes long
and it takes place in fucking polynesia

i was attracted to the movie because of its period
and because karl (who let me borrow the movie) said he liked it a lot
although karl and i agree that he enjoys adventure movies more than i do
but then also i read here:
(i've helpfully bolded the exciting parts!)

one of hollywood's strangest, sexiest pre-code fever dreams, king vidor's 1932 bird of paradise is a potentially tawdry tale of a seafaring sexual adventure to the tropics that transcends its titillation (though it does have plenty in the way of the risqué going on) to offer up a true dream world -- a sheerly escapist, almost entirely invented analogue to any recognizable reality, with dolores del rio no more believable as its "native" virgin isles princess as joel mccrea is as the seasoned sailor, and it doesn't matter, because their attractive limbs here look like they were made for the sole purpose of being entwined. the whole thing plays like the sexually/racially charged fantasy of a "civilized" (read: white) dreamer as regards a voraciously fetishized and irrationally feared darker people, but as potentially problematic as that is, it enhances rather than saps the film's interest. at this point, its story of the forbidden, intensely erotic passion between a muscular white american and a bronze, nubile islander feels much less like actually objectionable racial simplemindedness than a privileged peek into someone's (perhaps even yours or mine) fascinating, delirious, delusional subconscious, not to be taken at face value; it plays like a wet dream, with about as much plausibility and with the same odd, sometimes unexpectedly beautiful and focused intensity. it's rife with a kind of quasi-pornographic reduction of character to erotically physical presence, but however crude its racial and cultural assumptions may be, the appeal and power of bird of paradise survives its surface nonsense and soars anyway, escaping the fate of being a mere relic through its unique narrative structure, potent imagery, and the palpable eroticism and chemistry that engulfs its two leads in a swooning, hyperdramatic blaze of passionate sensuality and doomed love so hot that it leaves the viewer a little singed in its wake, too. 

lol
about to watch it and take photos on my phone like the old days
this is king vidor, one year after the father-son boxing melodrama the champ, three years after the all-black musical hallelujah!
joel mccrea (sullivan's travels, barbary coast) stars

--------------------------------------------------------
14:08 minutes into the movie
i paused the movie to check a tumblr i remembered during a stray thought
there were youtube video updates
the videos were related to shapes and architecture and time
i watched a little from 2/3 of them

so in this movie,
they arrived at their destination by their boat
all the natives came out on their canoes
the people on the boat threw "gifts" (i.e. their goodwill clothes and things like ice blocks and an alarm clock) into the ocean

the villagers dove for the gifts
they threw a knife for a woman

she caught it in the water with her teeth

a shark came
a guy tried to do something with a rope and the shark
he fell into the ocean tied to the shark
the woman cut the rope with her knife

they arrived at the island,
i think a celebration is happening itm (in this movie)

paused at 17:30 'cause i thought i saw someone
and then couldn't figure out if i thought i'd seen dan duryea or richard widmark
but neither appear to be in this movie, anyway

paused at 28:34 while the woman gets whipped
which is brutal
so much has happened
they went skinny dipping together
the american stayed behind when the boat left
and the old boat captain was like 'i think it's a good idea. wish i'd done it when i was young' or something
there were flying fishes

32.27 to watch the man slide down the hill on the plant while he cradles a squealing pig
34:41 paused for line "white man want you to stay here with him always" (tapping his own chest)
paused at 43:48 to record decreased interest in writing about this movie
unrelated to man getting a "paint job" (blackface) to rescue the woman
as she danced in the middle of the fire circle

58:54 A MAN UNDERWATER WRESTLED A TURTLE
AND THEN SURFED THE TURTLE BACK TO BEACH
something happened with the volcano
i think earlier they explained something about the volcano
but i wasn't interested in the volcano, at that time
anyway the volcano exploded

whirlpool

1.18:23 only like four minutes of the movie left, but i just had an instance of awake-dreaming, or something like that, like i was still awake and watching the movie but there was also a dream texture, and i was sure i was watching the movie with a friend at a friend's house, when that wasn't the case at all
so i'm going to sleep and i'll finish tomorrow
so close to the end lol

i finished the movie
karl likes adventure movies more than i do but
this was fun