The Cool World

What we have here is one of the most honest depictions of a culture I've seen in an American film. The montages of the streets of Harlem with the voice over feels like a poetic travelogue of a place and time you don't want to visit. This film also feels far ahead of its time, showing stuff you wouldn't see in Hollywood for at least another decade. I can see how this movie could have inspired the early features of Ralph Bakshi with its style and broad focus on urban characters from NYC.

Unfortunately this film is pretty obscure which means that tracking down a decent copy is hard, but it is possible to find a very grainy copy on YouTube.

"The Cool World", a 1963 independent film directed by Shirley Clarke is probably the most shocking, interesting, and realistic film I have ever seen. The films follows the character of Duke played by Rony Clanton. This film shows how it really was to be an African American teen growing up in urban America (Harlem, N.Y.) in the 1960's. The gun serves as a character in the film itself, for it demonstrates manhood for the character of Duke.

By no means is this film a glorification of street life that is so common today in American pop culture. The viewer will see in this film how ugly crime is especially these characters who are driven to commit crimes because of the desperate, depressed situations of the ghetto. The character of Duke searches throughout this movie for a gun to own as almost a way to arm himself against the failures that surround him daily such as rat infested tenements, garbage filled streets, drugs, pimps, prostitutes, gangs, and over zealous cops.

If John Cassevetes is considered the new phase of film making that occurred in the late 1950's with his superb film "Shadows" then Shirley Clarke is his female counterpart. Shirley Clarke masterfully merges documentary footage and Jazz music to the actual film that creates somewhat of a frightening, haunting, realistic portrait of urban America that I feel has not been seen very much in cinema since "The Cool World". It is interesting to note that actors Clarence Williams III, Antonio Fargas, Gloria Foster, and Peter De Anda who appeared in this film went on to make great strides of achievement in both film and television in the 1970's.

"The Cool World" is shown in many film festivals across the country. Unfortunately it is not on video, but someday I hope it will be for the world to see. I rate this movie **** excellent.

Shirley Clarke is one of those filmmakers I've heard about but I never seen any of her films, until now.

In New York at this time Cassavetes and many other filmmakers were doing films outside of the Hollywood system and tried to tell a different kind of film.

Shirley Clarke was definitely a part of this filmmovement using and deploying the same kind of style, tone and content.

This socialrealistic, gritty, dramadocumentary about street life in Harlem in 60's seen from a very young African American male by the name of Duke who joins a gang called the Pythons and starts waging a war against a rival gang called the Wolfs, is interesting albeit very flawed film experience.

At times this film is reminiscent of Cassavetes but being a very flawed film, the use of stock footage, voice-over, improvisational acting, etc means that Clarke sometimes ends up being a protegé to b-moviemaker Doris Wishman.

It may seem odd that I'm comparing the two but at times these two filmmakers seem to have a lot in common.

At best this film comes across as very dark, realistic portrayal of inner city youth crime in 60's. The film doesn't shy away from drugabuse, prostitution, interracial relationships etc.

Strangely, this film hasn't been released on DVD nor have Criterion, Masters of cinema etc released her films in a DVD box.

Shirley Clarke should get that treatment, she deserves it. And this film should be seen by more people interested in early American independent cinema.

There once was a a movement, mostly active in New York and a period in which movies were shot very raw, in an almost documentary like style. These type of movies try to give you an insight on the daily lives of often poor and struggling ethic groups, living in a certain part of town, as if it's really a documentary you are watching. Perhaps the best and also best known example of this style of film-making was John Cassavetes' 1959 movie "Shadows".

The movie is shot in the fashion of a documentary but that really doesn't mean that it also feels like one though. It's still very obviously an acted out movie, with scripted situations in it. The approach to it all still makes it feel like a very raw and also straight-forward movie, about crime, drugs and racial issues, all set in the Harlem ghetto, in New York City.

It's not necessarily a movie that follows a clear main plot line, which is consistent with this style of film-making but it's not really something that I like. Sure, it works out real fine for 20-30 minutes or so but after a while things just start to get less interesting to follow because there isn't really anything happening within the story and it isn't ever really going anywhere. I did understand the points the movie tried to make, with its raw approach, depicting the hard and desperate life within the ghetto but it just never came across as anything provoking or powerful.

It still could had been fine if only the movie had some more intriguing and likable characters in it. I don't really feel like we ever got to know any of them, which also doesn't really make you care about any of them or what happens within the movie its story. So no, this movie just isn't for me, though I'm still able to appreciate it and admire the way it got made and shot.

So still a movie I appreciated watching, just never one I ever loved.

7/10

http://bobafett1138.blogspot.com/

This film is a tremendous achievement. It is unbelievable to me that it is not being preserved and protected by those who have the power to do so. It absolutely SHOULD be available on video and it should be regularly mentioned in discussions of the great films of the "American New Wave". The previous commenter was absolutely right to compare it to a Cassavettes picture because it has a very similar feel, in that it seems not so much like a movie with a narrative, but just a "snippet" of a time, almost taken randomly for two hours. We get all kinds of wonderful experiences in that two hours, including 1960's Harlem, disillusioned youth run amok, gritty street fare, etc. Not to mention the music in the film(a fantastic jazz soundtrack). This is a very valuable film, and the fact that it is directed by a woman is significant, as this seems to be an under-appreciated voice in American cinema. Criterion, let's get it together and get this available for people to see. OK?