At the start of this six-minute Martin Scorsese film: a bathroom. White enamel. Stainless steel. Scorsese flickers through an assaultive series of insert shots of taps and drains. The first noteworthy detail of it all is that while it’s clean, it’s not spotless: we see dingy tiles, water spots, scuffs, a bit of soap-scummy grime. The faucet drips. We get all that before we move to the sink, where pops of color emerge: a red scrub-brush, a blue toothbrush and a yellow one.
“The Big Shave” will move into a nightmarish surreality, but at first, it’s only strange by virtue of intensity. Years of cinematic experience have taught us that bathrooms don’t get filmed with this kind of hypnotic pile-on of detail; there’s a stressfulness to how Scorsese hammers in the insistence that this is worth the audience’s attention. Look at it. Look at it.
It’s an ordinary bathroom, not an almost science-fictional space of eerily polished whites and chromes. (The jazzy tune, “I Can’t Get Started,” is a bit homey, like it could be pouring out of a radio.) The camera then insists this is someone’s ordinary bathroom, implying character before any real introduction.
And then, with the camera aimed at the mirror, everything goes white, just for a moment.
An ordinary man (Peter Bernuth) walks in, and with no frills, the film establishes—or pretends—that it’s an ordinary morning, one that comes with a yawn and a stretch.
Our man washes his face, takes his shirt off—we get several angles of this—and then he starts to shave. There’s an almost humorously lucid quality to this first shave, especially with Bernuth’s calm concentration. Add a mid-Atlantic voiceover, and this part feels like it could be an excerpt from some educational film teaching boys how to shave. One of the other titles of the film is “Viet ’67.” Think of all the things boys have been taught.
The man finishes his shave, but there’s a light sheen of sweat on his forehead as he luxuriates in rubbing in the aftershave—and the suddenly the camera jumps to him rubbing in shaving cream all over again. If you forgot about that mirror going white, about the build-up of dread, it’s back with that nauseating lurch. Right: this bathroom is important. Something is going to happen here.
Another lather, another shave, and blood starts to flow. Nicks become unfurled ribbons of red running down Bernuth’s chin and into the drain: spot, spot, spatter, gore. It’s methodical work, and Bernuth’s character goes about it unflinchingly and with great concentration. He had his normal shave in his normal bathroom, but it wasn’t enough. He was compelled to go further, to bleed the way all this needed him to, to bleed enough to justify it. To bleed enough to not have to go out from the ordinary bathroom into the ordinary day, maybe. If it’s in part a metaphor for depression, self-harm, and suicidality, it’s bleaker than a pitch-black one: it’s red. The music stops, but the input doesn’t. It’s blaring and bright. Bernuth puts down the razor, but he is, as far as we know, still standing. Grotesquely, it feels like he still has places to go and people to see, even though he’s a bloody mess.
One of the last shots is of blood running down his bare chest, and it feels like a dark payoff for him removing his shirt. There won’t be any mess, except to him. Bathrooms are easy to clean. He can probably get it back the way it was before. (Those dingy tiles.) It also feels like a dark parody of eroticism, and that makes it as good a time as any to remember that second toothbrush. Somewhere off-screen is someone also affected by all this, someone who never even got a chance to stop it.
“The Big Shave” is streaming on the Criterion Channel and HBO Max.
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Lauren James
Lauren James is a writer who wears many different hats (and pen names). She lives in Connecticut with her wife and two cats.
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Never noticed the second toothbrush but that’s a great insight and connects this to Raging Bull and Taxi Driver, where there’s a horrific and obvious impact on the people around the toxically masculine, violent protagonist.
I didn’t notice it until the rewatch! Good call on what it foreshadows for how Scorsese’s career would develop.
What did we watch?
Bottoms – really fun. I liked Shiva Baby a lot and it’s great to see Seligman and Sennott taking the larger canvas / budget / cast and getting really weird with it. I’d heard this was funny (which it is) but didn’t realise how anarchic and odd it was going to be. A really distinct sense of chaotic humour – there are clear nods to But I’m a Cheerleader and Heathers here but also the willingness to throw in completely absurd elements reminded me of Rock ‘n’ Roll High School, which obviously I love a ridiculous amount. Excited for whatever they do next!
Larceny, Inc. – Newly sprung con (and con artist) Edward G. Robinson and two buddies buy a luggage store next door to a bank with hopes of burrowing from one to the other, But fate in the form of the other businesses on the street and Robinson’s foster daughter, conspires to make the crooks go straight. Only another crook wants in on the plan. I had no idea that Robinson made crime comedies, three of them directed by Lloyd Bacon. This was the last, and while it’s pretty silly, it’s a lot of fun and Robinson is a natural comic. The cast is buoyed by such stalwarts as Jane Wyman, Broderick Crawford, Anthony Quinn, and Jack Carter. And look for Jackie Gleason and his already expressive face as a soda jerk.
The Practice, “Summary Judgements” – Ellenor and Lindsey sue the EPA for under-regulating the use of wood made with pesticides as a distraught couple wants someone to blame for their kids’ ill health (and the company that made the swing set is long out of business). A judge is dubious about this but allows the case to proceed. I have no idea if anyone has ever sued the EPA for doing too little, but the portrayal of the EPA’s lawyers is in Walter Peck territory. Meanwhile, Bobby is defending a friend accused of killing his wife. Not only is Bobby sure the man is not guilty, so is Helen, but Richard basically coaches a key witness to lie and the jury buys it. The fifth season starts here, with Jason Kravitz now part of the main cast, and two cases that really feel too familiar.
Watched the “NBA Cup” game between the Magic and the Heat for five minutes, and ran screaming from play by play man Eric Collins. Amazon hired Ian Eagle and Kevin Harlan, but for this game we get their opposite. He is just awful, loud, over the top, and not even prepared (he said the second game was at MSG when it was in Toronto. That seems pretty basic.)
Ladyhawke
Visually stunning, from the breathtaking scenery to the painterly use of light. This has a lot of fun going back and forth between high fantasy (the unworldly, fairy tale elegance of Rutger Hauer and Michelle Pfeiffer and their curse) and amiable low fantasy (scrappy, cheerfully thieving Matthew Broderick). I get that the score puts some people’s teeth on edge, but I found it strangely adorable. And indeed found pretty much the whole movie adorable. You don’t get unabashed fantasy on film all that often in the grand scheme of things, and this was charming.
I wasn’t that hot on the movie but I LOVED the score, haha.
Justified, Season Four, Episode One, “Hole In The Wall”
“You think tryin’ to do right by your children excuses everything, even kill a man.”
This is some good, old-fashioned Justified; some people trying to be clever and watching it blow up in their faces. It actually feels like it’s been a while since the show has gone this low-stakes; I love Raylan best in this scope and honestly I love the show best in it too; it’s exactly like the MOTW-vs-Mythology of X-Files, in the sense that it shows the characters at their best and most effective. Proviso: Justified in Mythology mode is as good as your average X-Files MOTW.
More specifically, this feels like everyone just going about their day jobs. Raylan is going after a criminal, criminals are just trying to steal shit and get away with it, and Boyd specifically is simply running his empire. Hitchcock said “I’m not making slices of life, I’m making slices of cake,” and interestingly, despite its extreme situations, Justified captures that just-another-day attitude of life.
One interesting note: the scenes with the sex worker who killed the john are interesting to me, in that they’re part of the pattern of people being used to the idea of having the shit beaten out of them; it specifically raises the idea that poor people commit violence not so much for actual protection as just a justification for getting to feel tough for a change. There’s a similar idea in an episode of The Shield where a teenaged rapist defends his actions on the basis of ‘when do I get to bust a nut?’, although this (female) character is less enthused and more sad about it.
I’m also amused by how Raylan realises he’s being an asshole here purely because he’s trying to get a bit of money for his kid. There’s this popular idea that having a kid makes you into a better person inherently, something undermined by a) me having met enough parents and b) the fact that it often drives people to do irrational and destructive things on the basis that they gotta pay for kids. As Raylan points out, you can justify anything when you think you’re the good guy, and I’ve seen some pretty shitty and even stupid things justified by people having kids.
“Where are you going?” / “I’m getting away from the window.”
This has Raylan famously repeat an old saying about assholes. I nearly cried at how hot Walton Goggins looked in a vest. Rhodes looking like Mitch Hedberg. Also a classic gag of a guy pretending to be antagonistic only to be an old friend.
“I got shit in the car I don’t need to be crushed.”
Biggest Laugh: No Art this episode. Hoping that means we get a whole bunch of him at once.
Biggest Non-Art Laugh: “Jesus, girl, you just showed me your tits forty-five minutes ago!”
Top Ownage: Raylan shooting an airbag to take down Jody.
This season will definitely give you some quality Art content, including a line my wife and I quoted all the time when we were living in Kentucky (as it was 100% accurate). We also revert to Raylan’s asshole quote a lot to describe a particular kind of person, and I love that it also kind of describes Raylan, at least sometimes.
Boyd’s vests are a thing of beauty and a joy forever.
I had not heard that Hitchcock line before, and that’s delightfully accurate.
Year of the Month update!
This December, we’ll be taking pitches on anything from 1948, like these movies, albums, and books.
Dec. 20th: Lauren James: The Lottery
And here’s the movies, albums, books, TV, and games from 1985 for you to write about next January.
Jan. 2nd: Gillian Nelson: Return to Oz
Jan. 5th: Tristan J. Nankervis: Rambo: First Blood Part II
Jan. 9th: Gillian Nelson: Advice on Lice
Jan. 16th: Gillian Nelson: The Wuzzles/The Gummi Bears
Jan. 19th: Tristan J. Nankervis: The Breakfast Club
Jan. 23rd: Gillian Nelson: The Golden Girls
Oh, man, let me see if I can carve out some time for January, because Tim and Fables of the Reconstruction deserve to be written about.