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Friday, February 15, 2008

LOL at ‘Cool School’

posted by on February 15 at 10:00 AM

“Cool School: How LA Learned to Love Modern Art” is one of the most fun art documentaries I’ve seen. (It opens next week in Seattle.)

Shot largely in black and white (with color accents) as a gesture by the filmmaker, Morgan Neville, both to memory and to a certain irony, I found myself laughing out loud several times. There’s important stuff here, sure—this scene, of the late 1950s and early 1960s, based at Ferus Gallery, was where Ed Kienholz’s grimy assemblages, Robert Irwin’s space-melting discs, and Andy Warhol’s soup cans made their first appearances on the world stage.

But there are also some hysterical cliches. For instance, the scenes where Dennis Hopper and Dean Stockwell sit in leather chairs, suck on cigars, and talk about real art, man.

Neville’s choice of Jeff Bridges as narrator—basically, the Dude—is pitch-perfect. When all the guys get together for a reunion, it’s “Broadway Danny Rose” all over again, nostalgic and cranky. Ken Price and Craig Kauffman (I think it’s those two) get in an argument over who blackballed Richard Diebenkorn from the gallery roster. Throughout, nobody holds back: Kauffman recalls the moment when he realized he was Irving Blum’s whore. Blum, in his genteel Cary Grant accent, recalls just how he stole Walter Hopps’s wife. Irving Karp disses LA from his perch in NY. Hopps, who everybody at first thought worked for the CIA because of his suits and his secretive voice, confesses his speed addiction. Just 12 days before his death, Hopps recites his favorite quote about art, by a poet friend of his: “Art offers the possibility of love with strangers.”

It’s great stuff, and Neville acts like the amber that encases canonical figures hasn’t hardened yet on these guys. The result is a movie that’s true to the best parts of its subjects.

the-ferus-gallery1.jpg
Given the machismo of these artists, I love the hugginess of this photo.

RSS icon Comments

1

Sounds fun. BTW, Jeff Richards starred in Broadway Danny Rose, if that's what you're getting at--not that he and Bridges don't look a little alike.

Posted by Kathy Fennessy | February 15, 2008 11:36 AM
2

Sounds fun. BTW, Jeff Daniels starred in Broadway Danny Rose, if that's what you're getting at--not that he and Bridges don't look a little alike.

Posted by Kathy Fennessy | February 15, 2008 11:37 AM
3

Sounds fun. BTW, Jeff Daniels starred in Broadway Danny Rose, if that's what you're getting at--not that he and Bridges don't look a little alike.

Posted by Kathy Fennessy | February 15, 2008 11:37 AM
4

Yeesh, three comments for the price of one, and the first is incorrect. My first multiple-post. Hurrah!

Posted by Kathy Fennessy | February 15, 2008 11:40 AM
5

no he didn't
no he didn't
no he didn't

Jeff Richards starred in The Secret of the Purple Reef
Jeff Daniels starred in Purple Rose of Cairo.
Woody Allen starred as Broadway Danny Rose

Posted by cody | February 15, 2008 2:07 PM
6

Cody, you got me. Clearly, I woke up on the wrong side of the bed today...

Posted by Kathy Fennessy | February 15, 2008 5:09 PM

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