What Did Pynchon Watch?

[LARSSON at vax1.mankato.msus.edu]

Steelhead drops names:
"OK, Don.  I'll buy that, to a point.  But if "Further" was part of the
System, and Cassidy, its charismatic leader, I'm not sure even I'd like
to join the Counterforce.  In this same vein, however, I'd have to toss
in Pynchon-buddy Paul Krassner's (the editor of the Realist) new retrospective
of those days Confessions of a Raving Unconfined Nut.
 
But here's a question for you (You like movies don't you, Don? All these
other Pynchon-heads seemed to have already been treated for that
malady--not me, I'd still rather look than read).  What the hell was
Ruggles watching, in those
days.  I have my ideas, like:
 
Preston Sturges' commedies, such as Miracle at Morgan Creek, Hail the
Conquering Hero, and Sullivan's Travels, which are so Pynchonesque
 
Buster Keaton, The General, the Navigator, Ballonitics, Cops, and the
Electric House, just to name a few of my favorites . . . "


Yep, the possibilities of crazy death, betrayal and just plain wackiness I
think have always kept P something of an outsider to movements in general
(another Emersonian legacy), but in re: your question about films:

the ones you mention are all worthy candidates.  Keep in mind that film was
just being rediscovered and considered to be something worthy of consideration
as P was coming of age--the same era (c. 1952-1968) as the emergence of the
European Art Cinema.  This was the age when the repertory/art house theater
abounded--at least in larger cities and college towns, and one could spend
one week watching double features of Greta Garbo and the Marx Brothers and
the next indulging in an all-Godard festival (I should know!).

Some specifics--Some are pretty obvious and form major motifs in GR:
DUMBO, KING KONG and THE WIZARD OF OZ especially. Also the Universal 1930s
monster cycle--DRACULA, FRANKENSTEIN, BRIDE OF FRANKENSTEIN and SON OF 
FRANKENSTEIN.  Many other specific titles are mentioned or alluded to--
STANLEY AND LIVINGSTONE ("Nothing in Africa but elephants and that Spencer
Tracy"  "Living Stone?  Oh yes, indeed"), George Stevens' GUNGA DIN 
("elephant medicine in the punchbowls")--costarring Cary Grant, THE GAY
DIVORCEE with Astaire and Rogers (source of "Looking for a Needle in Haystack"),
THE GOLD DIGGERS OF 1933 (source of "that dreamy Dick Powell song" that Slothrop
plays on the tuba, is it?), the 1941 version of DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE with
Spencer Tracy (again)--source of "You Should See Me Dance the Polka"; u.s.w.

And then there's German cinema, which is somewhat more problematic.  It's 
interesting that mentions F.W. Murnau only in passing, when some of FWM's films
(including NOSFERATU--the first film Dracula as well as FAUST) would seem to
be natural connections.  Most of the references are to Fritz Lang--and my
guess is that P hasn't seen some of his films--METROPOLIS, DR. MABUSE,
DER MUDE TOD (MABUSE is supposed to be available on video, BTW) he has, but
I'm not at all sure about DIE FRAU IM MOND or NIEBELUNGEN (Pokler never gets
to see Atilla the Hun "blow in from the East"--but in the film Atilla has
a home base and never charges in).  

I wonder if RANCHO PELIGROSO is an indirect reference to Lang's RANCHO NOTORIOUS
(also see SCARLET STREET if you want fatalistic obsession in an American
context).

And finally, there are anachronistic references to post-WWII films scattered
through the book, the most obvious being the Bengt Ekarot/Maria Casares Film
Festival at the end--both playing Death in THE SEVENTH SEAL and Cocteau's
ORPHEUS, respectively.  The allusions to Cocteau via the figure of Orpheus
resonate throughout the book and tie back to Rilke.  Note that Slothrop is
followed for a while by a sinister black Rolls Royce--the car Casares rides in
in the film.  Besides NORTH BY NORTHWEST (see Slothrop and Geli Tripping "north-
northwest of the Mittlewerk") and other Hitchcocks (especially the allusion to
the Statue of Liberty as a great setting for a chase scene), the pun "Gaucho
Marx" might have been lifted from THE MANCHURIAN CANDIDATE; Major Marvy sounds
a lot like Slim Pickens in DR. STRANGELOVE; the idea for a plastic that will
dissolve in the rain was used in Alec Guinness' comedy THE MAN IN THE WHITE
SUIT.  A couple of more obscure parallels (synchonicity, if not cause-and-effect
) come from LAST YEAR AT MARIENBAD (full of tracking shots down corridors like
those beloved by von Goll) and two from Luchino Visconti: LUDWIG (about the
mad king of Bavaria--"Something was in the air") and THE DAMNED.

Also never forget "The Blowout," the cartoon that inspired one of P's favorite
images--Porky Pig and the Anarchist.


One more thought: In V. there are three occasions where Benny Profane is tempted
by Fina but each time he rejects her while watching a movie--a Randolph Scott
film, an ancient Tom Mix movie and THE GREAT TRAIN ROBBERY--a retrogression from
the near-past to the silent era to the first narrative film to use editing 
(in the pop. histories anyway).

A similar retrogression occurs when Oedipa talks to Mr. Thoth in COL49.  He's
first watching a Leon Schlesinger cartoon--full animation of the kind directed
by Tex Avery, Chuck Jones and others--and mentions the Porky Pig cartoon, but
when she later tries out Nefastis' Maxwell's Demon, he's watching the limited-
animation mass-production Hanna-Barbera cartoons--Yogi Bear, Peter Potamus and
Magilla Gorilla--an example of entropy in action, for the animation 
connoisseur.

Don Larsson, Mankato State U (MN)