“YOUNG REBEL WITH A MOVIE CAMERA”

By Raymond Benson

Arrow has released an interesting time capsule of a boxed set that features early work by director Brian De Palma and starring a very young Robert De Niro before either of them were significant names in the motion picture industry. The films are The Wedding Party (made in 1963, released in 1969), Greetings (1968), and Hi, Mom! (1970).

De Palma had embarked on a film career in the very early 1960s when he was a student at various institutions. While at Sarah Lawrence College in New York, he collaborated with then-theatre-professor Wilford Leach (who went on to become a major stage director, designer, and writer) and Cynthia Munroe (who provided much of the script and funding) to make a feature entitled The Wedding Party. Most accounts (including IMDb) state that the movie was made in 1963; however, an essay by Brad Stevens in the accompanying Blu-ray booklet claims that the film was shot in 1964-65. It was eventually copyrighted in 1966, but wasn’t released until 1969, after the moderate success of De Palma’s first mainstream (of sorts) picture, Greetings (released a year earlier in ‘68).

The most interesting thing going for The Wedding Party is that it also sports the movie debut of De Niro, as well as Jill Clayburgh, William Finley, and Jennifer Salt (although De Niro’s name is misspelled in the credits as “Denero”—go figure). It’s one odd little movie, very low-budget, shot in black and white, and in a style reminiscent of early silent comedies (although it has sound). In a supplemental featurette, critic and filmmaker Howard S. Berger cites Richard Lester’s The Running, Jumping, and Standing Still Film (1959) as an influence, and one can see that. There is speeded-up footage in which characters run around, jump, fall, and drive cars in a comic, Keystone Cops fashion. There is also a French New Wave feel in that the picture is full of radical jump cuts. De Niro’s character, Cecil, is really a supporting role/groomsman to protagonist Charlie (Charles Pfluger), the groom of the titular event, and Josephine (Clayburgh), the bride. William Finley, who went on to star in other De Palma pictures, particularly Phantom of the Paradise, is another groomsman. The Wedding Party is a black comedy about the hypocritical rites of a wedding and the familial events leading up to it. There’s a laugh or two.

Greetings was another black comedy made in collaboration with co-writer/producer Charles Hirsch as the kind of pseudo-underground, low-budget, counterculture art film that budding filmmakers were creating to appeal to the college crowd in the late 60s (movies like Bob Rafelson’s Head or some of Roger Corman’s hippie-biker pictures come to mind). De Niro shares protagonist status with Gerrit Graham and Jonathan Warden as Jon, Lloyd, and Paul, respectively. Each young man is rebelling against society in some way. Paul wants to avoid the draft (so his pals help him be “gay”); Lloyd is obsessed with the Kennedy assassination and seeks to uncover its secrets; and Jon wants to be a pornographer. The picture is shot in a similar vein as was Wedding Party, albeit in color this time, with even more uncompromising editing. This time it’s got the whole late-60s pop thing going for it—shock-value subject matter, political commentary, drugs, violence, and sex. In fact, the latter component earned Greetings the distinction of being the first American mainstream movie to be officially given the “X” rating by the newly-established MPAA (it has since been re-rated “R”).

According to Hirsch, Greetings got mixed reviews but did good business, especially in New York, where it played well at art houses. It was decided that a sequel was in order, originally called Son of Greetings, but the title was eventually changed to Hi, Mom! Released in 1970, Mom almost received an “X” rating, but De Palma deleted part of a scene to get an “R.”

Hi, Mom! is yet another black comedy, and this one’s particularly subversive. It focuses solely on De Niro’s character, Jon, who has returned to New York after serving in Vietnam. Now he’s radicalized and wants to make a statement to the world. Hirsch calls the character “Taxi Driver Light,” and one can see a glimpse of Travis Bickle here in De Niro’s Jon. This time, Jon continues his venture into smut-making (with the help of pornographer Allen Garfield, continuing a role he started in Greetings) by filming across the street into people’s apartment windows, Rear Window-style. He falls for one of the victims of his voyeurism, Judy (Jennifer Salt). Most notable in the picture is a disturbing black and white sequence in which an off-off-Broadway troupe of black actors perform a show entitled “Baby, Be Black,” in which white audience members are forced to participate in the show, put on blackface, eat soul food, and then be terrorized by the actors (who are painted in whiteface). Not sure how this sequence would play for a modern audience! Look for early appearances by Charles Durning (credited as Charles Durnham) and Paul Bartel.

Arrow has done a top-notch job with these cinematic oddities. The High Definition Blu-ray (1080p) presentations with original English mono audio (uncompressed LPCM) look and sound surprisingly good. There are optional English subtitles. Supplements are plentiful. There’s a new audio commentary on Greetings by Glenn Kenny, author of Robert De Niro: Anatomy of an Actor; a new appreciation of De Palma’s and De Niro’s collaborations by critic and filmmaker Howard S. Berger; new interviews with Charles Hirsch; the pressbook for Greetings; the theatrical trailer for Hi, Mom!; reversible sleeves on the two jewel cases with commissioned artwork by Matthew Griffin; and booklets featuring pieces on the films by Brad Stevens, Chris Dumas, and Christina Newland, and an archival interview with De Palma and Hirsch.

All three films are curiosities, certainly fare for film historians and serious enthusiasts of De Palma and De Niro. For others, the trio will be considered very strange pieces of cinema that merely reflect the times in which they were made.

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