River's Yellow Sunflower

Thinking a lot about Dogfight lately - one of River’s finest movies, not to mention one of the most touching, beguiling little love stories ever put to film - some random info & quotes:

• A reminder that Warner Archives has recently reissued the previously hard-to-find Dogfight on DVD - wonderful news - so it’s more widely available now for those who’ve been yearning to purchase it; now you can watch it every year and cry your eyes out - and listen to the terrific Director’s commentary by Nancy Savoca. (Though admittedly it’s expensive, the film has garnered a cult classic following over the years and hopefully this will continue even stronger now. A step in the right direction towards River’s fantastic lesser-seen films being re-released and becoming more widely available.)

• For a brilliant and insightful assessment and follow-up discussion of the film, see the conversation by Sheila O’Malley and Matt Zoller Seitz here:

          http://www.sheilaomalley.com/?p=33135

• A little excerpt from October ’91 Premiere on River and Lili preparing to film a scene:

“In this scene, she [Rose] and Birdlace are talking in front of Rose’s Cafe, where Rose works with her mother, before tiptoeing upstairs to Rose’s bedroom.

According to the script, she’s already gotten drunk, thrown up, slugged Birdlace, forgiven him, and eaten a fancy dinner, his treat. For the actors, there’s such a dramatic shift in time and tone between this scene and the one they’ve just finished shooting that they decide to sit for a moment in the meticulously detailed cafe, replete with a newspaper headlining Kennedy’s trip to Dallas the next day, to reconstruct their evening.

“Okay,” Taylor tells Phoenix. “It’s 2 A.M. and we’ve had two hours of frolicking and talking.”

“Yeah. We felt good, and we kissed.”

“And now what? What about you?”

“Well….” Phoenix begins exhibiting signs of the uneasiness that his character might feel at being cut off from his buddies, left alone with a woman who demands the truth. “I guess I’m curious to see how far it’ll go.”

Some random quotes:

Nancy Savoca - Director:  “I wanna send my love out to River Phoenix. When I look at this movie, my heart just breaks at the potential, because I wanted to keep seeing his work and his growth. But I feel very privileged to have worked with him when he was at this wonderful stage of doing such a daring thing.”

Holly Near - celebrated folk singer and actress, who played Rose’s mother: “If you had more young men like River than like Eddie Birdlace, you wouldn’t have a Marine Corps.”

Lars Beckerman - who played a bit part Marine:  “River was an absolute pleasure to work with and to be around. He bought a banged up Volvo wagon (his weekly per diem matched my weekly salary!) and chauffeured all his fellow “Bees” and me around town when we had days off. He picked up dinner tabs and made life at the Warwick hotel amusing and unpredictable. One night he and his younger brother, then known to all of us as Leaf (now Joaquin), showed up with motorized toy speedboats that we proceeded to take down to the hotel pool and put to the test. If my memory serves, Rob Lowe was in the vicinity (jacuzzi), dating – and eventually marrying - our makeup woman at the time - but I digress..River was thoughtful and sweet, not an ounce of territorial actor neurosis, a rare quality.”

and on River’s ‘method’:   “As far as I could tell, although this was not ever a topic of discussion, River was not a Method actor, meaning his acting process did not require him to actually live the experiences and emotions necessary to fill out his character [at all times]. Personally speaking, the Method is a tough row to hoe, not just for the actor but for the entire crew, not to mention his or her family. Having said that, River’s approach to creating ‘Birdlace’ appeared to be rooted at least partially in the Method. He smoked a lot and at dinner drank a lot. “

River’s bitchin’ t-shirts  (tic-tac-toe editon)