BILLY WILDER passes away...

Whew… the fuzzy end of the lollipop… That not so tasty, moment where you realize that you have an absence of sweetness in your mouth. Moments ago I found out that Billy Wilder had passed away.

Billy Wilder is dead.

Now to a whole bunch of people out there that means nothing. Nothing because they have never discovered the genius of Billy Wilder. Billy was simply as great as they ever get. One of the last transcendently perfect writer/directors to ever call action… to ever rip a page from a typewriter.

I have never met the man, Billy Wilder, but I have met the art and the film of Mr Wilder. So much so that in my book that came out this month, two of the chapters are actually titled for one of his movies. THE BIG CARNIVAL and ACE IN THE HOLE… Both of which are in fact the same movie. How could I not? "I can handle big news and little news. And if there's no news, I'll go out and bite a dog." To many, this is Wilder’s forgotten film. The movie most seem to not remember, to not acknowledge. Often times in career rundowns of Kirk Douglas and Billy Wilder this one is oddly missing. Not in my book… So nice I counted it twice. "I don’t pray. Kneeling bags my nylons!"

Billy was about more than any one film though. God, more than about a dozen films still. Billy’s movies captured what is best about intimate cinema. He could swing from the paralyzing intimacy of Norma Desmond’s disintegration dead on into the camera as she strangled out:

"And I promise you I'll never desert you again because after 'Salome' we'll make another picture and another picture. You see, this is my life! It always will be! Nothing else! Just us, the cameras, and those wonderful people out there in the dark! ...All right, Mr. DeMille, I'm ready for my close-up."

And Don Birnam’s lost weekend spilling of wisdom like this:

"It shrinks my liver, doesn't it, Nat? It pickles my kidneys, yeah. But what it does to the mind? It tosses the sandbags overboard so the balloon can soar. Suddenly I'm above the ordinary. I'm competent. I'm walking a tightrope over Niagara Falls. I'm one of the great ones. I'm Michaelangelo, molding the beard of Moses. I'm Van Gogh painting pure sunlight. I'm Horowitz, playing the Emperor Concerto. I'm John Barrymore before movies got him by the throat. I'm Jesse James and his two brothers, all three of them. I'm William Shakespeare. And out there it's not Third Avenue any longer, it's the Nile. Nat, it's the Nile and down it moves the barge of Cleopatra."

To the light-spirited laughter from Marilyn Monroe stating, "When it gets hot like this, you know what I do? I keep my undies in the icebox!"

When Billy wanted to tell a big story, a huge story about one of the greatest moments of man’s triumph… He told it in a cockpit… drew us in close… gave him a bubblegum stuck mirror and an inner monologue. He made Lindbergh’s plane a character… a straight man for Stewart to play to.

My god could I wallow in the discussion of this man’s genius for days. I could talk all night about Jack Lemmon taking care of the suicidal Shirley MacLaine. The way she curled up in the bed, the way the lonely C.C. Baxter stared at this curiously fragile creature… this vital beauty with whom he was in love… nursing her back to health and stability. At all times trying to do the right thing. There was an absurdist quality to it all, but the air of reality… the weight of the actions were real. The Apartment and what he was using it for to forward his career was funny and light and clever, but the toil on the lives… the price that was being paid… brutal genius. Smart with a capital S.

I could sing the praises of the greatest courtroom drama this side of TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD in WITNESS FOR THE PROSECUTION. The genius that Billy brought out of Marlene Dietrich. The awesome flair of Charles Laughton… the way he has his little victories against Elsa Lanchester. The utter shock of the ending, M. Night still has a good 7000 miles Rocky Mountain Trails to go before he can twist with the best.

He was one of the first to give birth to Film Noir with DOUBLE INDEMNITY. Barbara, Ed and Fred were all never better. A film that squeezed the atmosphere of Fritz Lang’s M into a new genre of filmmaking. From the set-ups to the dialogue to the performances… bliss on screen.

As I sit here rolling the films in the lobes of my noggin, I find that perhaps there was no filmmaker more in love with film itself than Billy Wilder. You look at his work, his camera made love to his actors, his dialogue was written to be pleasure centers for the actors saying it and the audience hearing it. He often liked to start things by just talking straight to the audience… He was a filmmaker that knew there was an audience and he made personal real movies that spoke to them, him and everyone around the world.

Billy Wilder is dead, but he leaves us not only his films, but Cameron Crowe, Frank Darabont, Wes Anderson amongst others. I once heard that a qualification to work with Spielberg was the ability to talk about THE APARTMENT without flinching. To just be able to spill into minutiae of that genius.

I had planned to go do a bunch of movies tonight… A whole big gaggle of cinema, I will… but when I come home, snuggle up in my bed… I’m going to be in Billy’s world for the next couple of days. I can’t wait to just dive in. Dive in and swim.

If I may be so bold to suggest my favorite Wilder titles for you home video and Dvd collection, here I go: Start with NINOTCHKA which he wrote. Then go into THE APARTMENT and SEVEN YEAR ITCH. Next change your pace by diving into SUNSET BLVD and STALAG 17. Pour a double scoop of WITNESS FOR THE PROSECUTION and THE SPIRIT OF ST LOUIS. Wallow with LOVE IN THE AFTERNOON followed by SABRINA and IRMA LA DOUCE. Then finish yourself off with THE LOST WEEKEND and if you can find it (RELEASE THIS ON DVD NOW PLEASE!!!) ACE IN THE HOLE aka THE BIG CARNIVAL!

That’s your weekend… now mush… and remember any world that can produce the Taj Mahal, William Shakespeare, and striped toothpaste can't be all bad. Especially one that brought us Billy Wilder…