353 - Blast of Silence, United States, 1961. Dir. Allen Baron.

Tuesday, December 19, 2017

353 - Blast of Silence, United States, 1961.  Dir. Allen Baron.

Frankie Bono is born.  The train rumbles through the tunnel like a fetus rumbling through the birth canal.  It bursts screamingly into the sunlight as an infant breathing its first breath.

It stops at Penn Station.

Frankie Bono gets off.  A hit man.  A hit man who is more than a hit man.  He is also a man.

Frankie boards the Staten Island Ferry.  He sees the skyline.  He reads the paper.  A stranger asks him for a match.  Frankie tells him he is from Cleveland.  And we know.  He is not a stranger.  He is giving the password.  Initiating the job.  Hiring the hire.

The man passes Frankie a plastic bag.  The instructions are inside.  Half the money is inside.  He will be paid the rest when the job is done.

We know that story.  But we do not know this story.  So Allen Baron tells us this story.

Frankie is from Cleveland.  Originally from Chillicothe.  New York now.  Brooklyn.  He prefers the big city.  He can be alone.  He can hide.

Killing is not personal.  It is professional.  A killer does not know the man he is killing.  He is merely doing his job.

But Frankie has to make it personal.  He has to find a reason to kill.  A reason to do the job.  Otherwise, he cannot do it.  He watches his target.  Makes up things about him.  Imagines his weaknesses.  Invents things to hate.  Creates, invents, and nurtures hate.

Artificial hate.  Manufactured hate.

For the sake of doing a job.

He stands like an escort looking for a lover as he leans against the railing, watching his prey.

He thinks he is a gentleman just because his shoes are shined.  Therefore, I will hate him.  Therefore, I will kill him.

A professional is always alone.  Baron explores that idea.  Why is a man ever alone?  When he is a hit man we do not think about it.  When he is a man we see the personal and social side of it.  So let us look at him as a man.

Frankie goes to a party.  He is out of place.  A misfit.  As a professional he is in his element.  Alone and strong.  As a man he is out of place.  Alone and awkward.

People at the party want to talk to him.  He does know what to say.  They play music.  He does not know what to do.  Dance?  No.  Hey, let us play a game.  Push a peanut across the floor with your nose.  Yeah.  Okay.

He goes home with a girl.  She pours them drinks.  He makes a pass at her.  Aggressive.  Forceful.  Awkward.  She pushes him away.  I'm sorry, Lori.  She tells him to forget it.  Just go.  He asks if he can stay.  She pours him coffee.  He apologizes profusely.  He does not know why he did it.  She tells him he needs a girl.  Someone to comfort him.  To make him feel better.  Someone to come home to.

He goes and kills a man.  A large man.  Who lives alone in his apartment with rats.  Not pest rats.  Pet rats.  The large man is not a target.  The large man is what happens when things go wrong.  Frankie has to eliminate him.

He places a phone call from a pay phone.  I had to kill Big Ralph.  Yeah.  So?  But that is not the point.  I want out.  He starts to explain.  They do not want him to explain.  Now you are in trouble.  You will finish the job.  And you are in trouble.

Frankie realizes he is lonely.  Lori was right.  He needs a girl.  Someone to comfort him.  To make him feel better.  Someone to come home to.

He goes to Lori.  Her boyfriend is there.  You misunderstood me.  I said you needed a girl.  I did not mean me.

He walks away.

Frankie does his job.  He breaks in to the target's house.  He lies in wait.  He hits the target.  The target and the teddy bear.  The teddy bear apparently for the target's grandson.  A little boy has just lost his pawpaw.  The target.  He too is a man.  He too is human.

Frankie kicks him over for good measure.

Allen Baron takes us on a tour of New York.  Brooklyn.  Manhattan.  Harlem.  The Apollo Theater.  Penn Station.  Rockefeller Plaza.  Greenwich Village.  McDougal Street.  Commerce and Barrow.  Bleecker Street.  Spring Creek.  The East River.  The Village Gate.  Long Island.  Manhattan Bridge.  The Brooklyn Bridge.  The Staten Island Ferry.  Jamaica Bay.

Yeah.  Jamaica Bay.  Not at Roxbury.  Not at Breezy Point.  Not at Rockaway Park.  But in the estuary.

Or more precisely, the marsh.  The morass.  The quagmire.  Which pretty much sums up his life.

Frankie crosses the plankbuilt footbridge to try to get away.  To be alone again.  As a man it is not good to be alone.  As a professional he had better be alone.  Otherwise . . . well, remember that phone call?  He should not have made that phone call.  Now he is in trouble.  Frankie did the job.  But he is in trouble.

And now he is alone.

Forever.

Sunk in the slough.  Slumped in the sludge.  Dumped in the muck.  Submerged in the slush.

Frankie was born in the train in the tunnel.

And he dies in the ooze of the brine.

Goodbye, Frankie.

Now you can be alone.

At least it was not personal.

As long as we see you only as a hit man.

And do not see you

as a man.