CABARET: Blu-ray reissue (ABC/Allied Artists, 1972) Warner Archive
At the time of
its release, the most amazing thing about Bob Fosse’s Cabaret (1972) was that it was made at all. The film had near
insurmountable hurdles to overcome, not the least of which was that musicals in
general were considered passé by the mid-1960's and all but ostracized in the
public taste after 1970. Add to this a footnote: Fosse, once considered a
bankable choreographer/director, had failed spectacularly with his big screen
reincarnation of Sweet Charity (1969).
More on this in a moment. Yet in reviewing Cabaret
today, one can unequivocally state the most impressive aspect of the film is it
was not simply made, but concocted with extraordinary craftsmanship to
culminate in a resounding critical and financial success; arguably, the first
‘dramatic’ musical with very ‘adult’ sensibilities. Okay…the second, after West Side Story (1961). The malaise of
pre-national socialism in uber-cosmopolitan Berlin was first critiqued in
Christopher Isherwood’s 1930 novel, Goodbye
to Berlin; later paired with another story by Isherwood that gained modest
literary prominence but attracted little attention in Hollywood - for obvious
reasons. Setting aside Mel Brook’s farcical, The Producers (1967), Nazis were not something to readily sing
about on the big screen.
Then, in 1950,
playwright John Van Druten resurrected Isherwood’s stories in his film and
stagecraft, I Am A Camera; a decade later, transformed and rechristened as
the Broadway musical Cabaret. Ten
years after that came the movie; a monumental undertaking, given the intense
dislike of movie musicals. But Cabaret
– the movie – had another reason for not getting made: Bob Fosse. Fosse, whose
singular childhood ambition had been to become a dancer on par with Fred
Astaire, and who exhibited extraordinary agility as a dancer/choreographer
during the final bow of the MGM musical in the 1950's, had successfully shifted
gears to become stage director of the Tony award-winning smash ‘Sweet
Charity’; a musical that promised to revitalize the waning popularity
of the Hollywood musical. Regrettably, the film incarnation of Sweet Charity was an unmitigated
disaster. Expensive and overproduced, it threatened to bankrupt Universal and also
effectively relegated Fosse to the dustbin as a forgotten relic from Hollywood’s
golden age.
Yet in hindsight
Cabaret – the movie - had the luxury
of time on its side. Each writer who approached Isherwood’s original stories
brought something new and refreshing to the material, crystalizing the
relationships between characters only superficially explored in his work and
drawing out a flair for irony in its historical drama that mainly took its cue
in glib comedic undertones. Fosse’s
approach to the material was as crisp and revitalizing. The stage show, in
fact, adhered to a time-honored principle of both the stage and Hollywood
musical: namely, having its central cast spontaneously burst into song either
within or apart from the obvious trappings of Berlin’s seedy Kit-Kat Klub. For
the film, Fosse ditched all of the non-diegetic score, focusing (with one
exception) on songs and routines that take place on the club’s stage. In
another stroke of genius Fosse used virtually all of these songs to reference
the dramatic tensions taking place elsewhere in Berlin. A harmless
hand-slapping polka, as example, became juxtaposed with images of the club’s
owner being brutalized by a trio of Nazis just outside. The ‘divinely decadent’
Money-Money exemplifies cabaret
singer, Sally Bowles (Liza Minnelli) fascination for wealthy playboy,
Maximillian von Heune (Helmut Griem), while ‘Mein Herr’ basically foreshadows the film’s plot in totem; that of
ill-fated love affairs, feckless and based on nothing more than casual sex,
ultimately destined to end ‘unhappily ever after’ for all concerned.
Fosse keeps Jay
Presson Allen’s screenplay tight and to the point, drawing parallels between
the gaudy artistic freedoms found inside this dimly lit ratskeller and the
growing external animosities brewing topside in the light of day where the
traditional Germanic world of Hegel, Nietzsche and Weber is soon to be
ruthlessly torn apart by the insidious filtration of National Socialism. We
enter the world of Cabaret
appropriately with Master of Ceremonies’ (Joel Grey) invitation to partake in
the debaucheries of 1931 Berlin. Grey’s introductory number is deliberately
campy and vulgar; sung slightly off key while flanked by an obvious transgender
chorus line. Like the song, the world we have just entered will increasingly
become off-putting, even perfunctorily ugly as the central romance gets mired
down in this self-destructive cesspool. Of course, the trick and magic of it
all is Fosse never allows the tawdry to disgust us. Like the powerful lure of
tabloid journalism or pornography, every nuance in Cabaret has been designed to appeal to our very base sensations and
instincts; a deliciously wicked temptation that is as calculated, intoxicating
and yet toxic to our moral sensibilities as the opening of a vein for
recreational drug use.
Fosse inserts
brief glimpses of British English teacher, Brian Roberts (Michael York)
arriving by train. On the surface, Brian has come to Berlin to give tutorials
in English so he can earn enough money to complete his doctorate in philosophy
from Cambridge. But in essence the rest of the film’s narrative is an exercise,
to give this teacher an education, breaking down his defenses, and forcing him
to come to terms with his own conflicted bisexuality. Arriving at Fraulein
Schneider’s (Elisabeth Neumann-Viertel) boarding house, Brian is introduced to
fellow tenant, Sally Bowles; a charming American scatterbrain whose one
impenetrable desire is to become a famous actress. From the beginning we sense Sally
is a fractured soul – someone desperately fabricating a persona as a glamorous
vamp to impress and distract us from her innate vulnerability. Despite vastly
different views on life and love, Brian and Sally quickly establish a lasting
friendship. She even allows Brian to use her more spacious suite to teach his
private lessons, and, is also instrumental in securing 50 Marks from Herr
Ludwig (Ralf Wolter); the middle-aged author of racy sex tales, interested in
having Brian do an English translation of his latest smutty novel.
This Bohemian
lifestyle appeals to Brian very much – at first. Nightly, he finds diversionary
entertainments on tap at the Kit Kat Klub, while daily he strives to school his
latest pupil, Fritz Wendel (Fritz Wepper) on the art of speaking good English.
During one of these lessons, Fritz and Sally are introduced to another pupil,
Natalia Landauer (Marisa Berenson); the stylish daughter of a wealthy Jewish
merchant. Sexually frustrated, Fritz
pursues an unrequited romance; one repeatedly and reservedly deflected by
Natalia who fears their religious backgrounds will cripple any chances for
lasting happiness. The wrinkle herein is Fritz is also a Jew – closeted by
anxieties his Christian friends would not remain friendly for very long if only
they knew his true identity. Brian and Sally’s friendship makes the rather
awkward transition to becoming lovers. He openly admits his prior relationships
with women have all been disasters, while she erroneously sets about to break
him of his closeted homosexuality. In the meantime, Sally is accidentally
introduced to wealthy German playboy, Maximillian von Heune; a rather cruel
detachment that simultaneously sparks and inflames Brian’s jealousy and desire.
Whisked away by Max to his elegant country house for the weekend, Brian endures
the rather brutal humiliation of watching the woman he has come to love make a
rather handsome spectacle of herself. But Max has also become quite smitten
with Brian – a disposable attraction that threatens to destroy Brian and
Sally’s fragile affair when each discovers that the other has been indulging
their sexual whims with the same man.
Max buys Sally a
stylish fur coat, then takes Brian to a beer garden; a pleasurable enough
rendezvous that turns utterly rancid when both men are confronted by a Hitler
youth (Oliver Collignon) warbling ‘Tomorrow
Belongs to Me’ – a melodic ballad begun in extolling the virtues of a
Germanic paradise on earth, but concluding on a decidedly more disturbing note
of totalitarianism. Max sheepishly bows out of Sally and Brian’s squabble, and
later from his promise to take them on an African safari. Sally learns she is
pregnant and Brian, despite not knowing if the child is his, vows to look after
her. The two make plans to leave Berlin for England. Regrettably, Sally suffers
another bout of crippling insecurity, largely rooted in her inability to come
to terms with the estranged relationship she has with her father – an
ambassador who takes absolutely no interest in her private life. Natalia
confides in Sally that she loves Fritz, but cannot marry him because of their
religious differences. However, after Natalia’s beloved schnauzer is killed by
a pair of Hitler youth, Fritz confesses he too is Jewish and the two are
married in one of Berlin’s synagogues.
Frustrated by
Sally’s inability to commit to him wholeheartedly, Brian defies a pair of Nazis
handing out pamphlets on the street corner and is beaten to the point of
hospitalization. Sally rushes to Brian’s side and the two reconcile their
differences. But as Brian’s recovery ends and he begins to pack for his and
Sally’s trip to England he learns too late Sally has had an abortion. It seems
her career means more to her than having his baby. Recognizing Sally cannot,
and never will change, but still unable to despise her for the heartless wanton
that she is, Brian spends his final night in her room, comforting her tears and
insecurities. The next day, Sally escorts Brian to the train depot, leaving him
before his train departs to return to the Kit Kat Klub – arguably, the only
fame and success she will ever know in life. The film ends as it began, with
the Kit Kat’s Master of Ceremonies bidding the club’s patrons welcome, only now,
its clientele is made up almost exclusively of very stolid Nazi soldiers.
Cabaret is a frightfully ambitious, often disturbing
masterwork; its unsettling fiction firmly based in an even more ominous
reality. One can argue 1961’s West Side
Story holds the dubious distinction of being the first ‘adult’ musical by
design; interjecting a sobering morality into the effervescent milieu of the
big-budget musical. But Cabaret does
more than simply explore or even exploit a pressing social issue through song
and dance. In fact, it takes one of the darkest chapters of the 20th
century and turns our expectations for both it and the Hollywood musical on
end. In hindsight, Bob Fosse was the ideal choice to direct Cabaret; his artistic sensibilities
deftly to parallel the perversity in these two self-destructing epochs: the
more progressive laissez faire pre-war attitudes steeped in liberalized
devil-may-care feel-good, and the self-imploding ultra-totalitarianism looming
on the horizon. Neither embodies the Utopian metropolis celebrated within the
philosophic teachings of Kant or Schweitzer. Yet Fosse seems to be suggesting neither
is more or less perfect or fundamentally flawed than the other. Even his exultation
of the prewar period with all its’ ‘divine
decadence’ becomes a tragedy, mounting to a slow sad death knell, forever
to crush the daydreamer and the lover, and finally, alter the European
landscape for all time. In this regard, Cabaret
plays very much like a curious amalgam of the traditional British drawing
room farce and a David Lean epic with its fragile narrative dedicated to a
bittersweet romance set against the sweeping panorama of world-changing events.
In retrospect, Cabaret is also a star-making vehicle
for Liza Minnelli – her one brief and very shiny moment as both an all-around
entertainer worthy of the inheritance from that considerable artist mantle
begun by parents, Vincente Minnelli and Judy Garland. Herein, Liza is magical –
an appetizingly vampy, occasionally campy, but never anything less than genuine
and utterly majestic pixie whose profligacy blows as casually as the wind in
any and all directions. When Liza sings her voice throbs in unapologetic aplomb
for selfishly choosing to suck the marrow out of life, whatever its
consequences. And when she acts, she remains the epitome of that ‘go to hell’
self-indulgence that would ultimately destroy its own generation. Cabaret is also notable for Joel Grey
as our leering Master of Ceremonies; a vivaciously creepy presence, at once
guiding and goading the audience with his guiles. It is Grey who draws us into
accepting Berlin’s seedy underbelly as a pleasurable diversion; Grey, who
infrequently makes wild-eyed social commentaries on the evolving relationships
between Sally and Brian, and, Fritz and Natalia that hint at some cataclysmic
outcome; Grey, who craftily lures us in with the sympathetic ballad, ‘If You Could See Her’ – sung with great affection for a gussied up gorilla, before exposing it as an
unflattering and utterly warped caricature of ‘the Jew’ - ugly and mindless. And Grey is demonic, yet
mouthwatering in this portrait; salivating venom for these afflictions that
have corrupted the audience along the way. More than any other character in Cabaret, Grey’s Master of Ceremonies
embodies the corrosive repugnance of pre-war Berlin.
Michael York,
Helmut Griem and Marisa Berenson all give ample support to this exercise. But Cabaret belongs to Minnelli and Grey as
counterpoints of this same vapid, yet increasingly maniacal social structure,
destined to wreck themselves, a people and a nation being plunged into another World
War. The proof is in Bob Fosse’s structuring of the musical numbers – performed
exclusively by either Minnelli or Grey or together – sparking off each other’s
slickly packaged perversions, all of them subversive and thought-numbing deceitful. In the final analysis, Cabaret is about as undiluted and frank
as any film musical can be and still pitch itself as both tune-filled and ‘feel
good’. Few movies before or since – and no movie musical since - has dared to
be as artistically bold.
I am not at all
certain I prefer the direction the Warner Archive (WAC) is moving; reissuing deep catalog
on Blu-ray already available via their mainstream Warner Home Video
apparatus, while far too many as deserving movie musicals from both MGM and Warner’s
own golden age remain absent in hi-def. Cabaret was released to Blu back in
2011 in a handsomely packaged digibook that also included a CD sampler of the
soundtrack. We lose all of that this time around, but mercifully keep the
digital extras that accompanied the previous release. In keeping with WAC’s
commitment, we also get original cover art this time around. Decades ago, Cabaret’s original camera negative went
missing; an oddity never fully explained away. As such every home video
incarnation has been derived from less than perfect print masters with the
results often being excessively grainy and exceedingly dull. Working from an
interpositive back in 2011, Warner resurrected much – if not all – of Geoffrey
Unsworth’s magnificent vintage look for the film in stunning 1080p clarity. The
experience of Cabaret was never
about eye-popping Technicolor, and herein the Blu-ray manages to resurrect
Unsworth’s evocative and moody darkness. Red is the most prominent color evoked
in this transfer. Flesh tones can appear quite natural but infrequently suffer
– too orange in spots. There is a remarkable amount of fine detail present and
some handsome film grain – at long last – accurately reproduced. Contrast is,
for the most part, bang on. Truly, you will not be disappointed. Nor will the
5.1 audio leave you wanting for more. WAC’s reissue retains the featurette – Cabaret: The Musical That Changed Musicals.
Three additional featurettes (two made at the time of the film’s release and
one to mark its 25th Anniversary) are also included, plus a comprehensive audio
commentary from some years ago and theatrical trailer to round out your viewing
enjoyment. Bottom line: if you do not already own the previous Blu, then you
should consider snatching this one up.
FILM RATING (out of 5 – 5 being the best)
4
VIDEO/AUDIO
4.5
EXTRAS
3
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