"The Juggler" with Kirk Douglas (1953)

 

This was my first time seeing this film. I had never heard of it before today. It was posted on You Tube 5 days ago. Kirk Douglas plays Hans Müller, a displaced German freed from the Concentration Camps. It is 1949 and he arrives in the newly formed State of Israel.

Before the war he was a famous juggler and ventriloquist in Germany. He thought his fame would shield him from the Nuremberg Laws and all that followed. So he stayed. And paid the price. 

Now, in Israel, and in a Camp for newly arrived Refugees, he initially mistakes a woman for his deceased wife. He doesn't adjust well to the camp, or the attempts to assimilate him into society. He flees the camp and sets off to see the outside. 

What happens next is the story of a man who has been traumatized and now becomes hunted in a new land where he is supposed to be accepted. It is a gripping film. And Kirk Douglas is perfect in his role, along with all the rest of the cast. I highly recommend this film.

"Lonely are the Brave" with Kirk Douglas and Gena Rowlands (1962)

Kirk Douglas has described this film as being amongst his favorites. The story takes place in the modern day west of the early 1960’s. The Wild West had been long gone by that time, but sometimes people are unwilling, or even unable, to change with the times. Jack Burns, played by Kirk Douglas, is such a man. Riding his horse across the freeway is just one of the many ways he chooses to show his pure contempt for the modern world with its myriad of rules and excess regulations. He carries no identification, has no driver’s license, no military record, and as a matter of fact; if he weren’t standing before you; he officially would not exist.

But when he sets out in order to get arrested so that he can break his friend out of jail, he finds that though his spirit for the fight has not diminished over the years, the fight has become harder than it ever was. With all of these fences and signs and rules, a man could lose his most valuable asset; himself.

When his friend Paul Bondi; played by Michael Kane; decides to stick out his final 2 years in prison, Jack breaks out without him, igniting a manhunt which includes the Sheriff; played with great sympathy by Walter Matthau; and also the Deputy Sheriff; viciously portrayed by George Kennedy.

Throughout the movie Paul Bondi’s wife, Jerry; played by Gena Rowlands in stretch pants; is on the sidelines, rooting for her husband’s best friend, while reviling the modern world which cannot accept an individual for what he is.

In the end, when justice is served, the viewer has to wonder what justice really is. Is it just a set of rules which must be followed at all costs? And, does the crime of being true to oneself, and a set of values, ever justify squashing the individual spirit? Reminiscent in many ways of “Cool Hand Luke”, which also featured George Kennedy, and even “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest”, this film will stay with you long after you have watched the ending credits. 

"Out of the Past" with Robert Mitchum, Kirk Douglas and Rhonda Fleming (1947)

Robert Mitchum is quiet, but tough, in this thriller set a few hundred miles from Los Angeles in the late 1940's. As a former Private Investigator, Jeff Bailey has a past which he wants to leave behind him. He works at a small town garage with a deaf mute, played by Dickie Moore. Life seems a bit boring, but sometimes boring can be a good thing.  All of that is about to change, however, when a stranger comes to town, summoning Jeff back to his old life, and his former underworld connection, Whit Sterling, played by Kirk Douglas.

Jeff has been seeing a local girl, Ann, played by Virginia Huston, and she knows nothing of his past. Before he leaves town to meet Whit at Lake Tahoe, Jeff calls her and tells her the truth about his past. He had been hired by Whit to find his missing girlfriend Kathie, played by Jane Greer, who has run off with $40,000 of Whit's money. Jeff finds her in Acapulco, but not the money. At the same time that he is trailing her, he falls in love with her. Making their escape from Whit, they hide out in a cabin in the mountains outside of Los Angeles. But a former partner of Jeff's finds them there, launching the pair into a series of double crosses and half truths, which result in his partner's death. When Jeff finds that Kathie does have the $40,000 he leaves her, setting off a chain of events that can have only one conclusion.

"Seven Days In May" with Frederic March, Kirk Douglas, and Burt Lancaster

Director John Frankenheimer had his pulse on the State of the Union when he directed this political thriller set in the White House amidst the height of the Cold War. Coming, as it did, on the heels of his 1962 release of Richard Condon's "Manchurian Candidate", these two films are a blueprint of what was happening in Washington during those years. President Kennedy watched "The Manchurian Candidate" at least three times in 1962 and 1963. When "Seven Days In May" was being considered for production, the President went so far as to phone Kirk Douglas, urging him to make the film.

Briefly, this film concerns the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the military group which surrounds the President and advises him during times of National peril. They wield enormous power. Although by theory they serve to implement the President's decisions, the possibility always exists that they have the capability to assert the ultimate control in the form of a coup. Most people think that this can never happen here in America, while some think that it has already happened, at least once.

In reality, this film was made during the time that President Kennedy was pushing through his landmark Test Ban Treaty in the summer of 1963, shortly before his assassination. In the movie, the President is making the case for a Test Ban Treaty while under pressure from the Joint Chiefs of Staff, who not only oppose the President, but in some cases actually question his motivations.

When an alert Officer, Colonel Casey, played by Kirk Douglas, accidently comes across some things that make no sense, he begins to piece together the plot that is being assembled by fellow Officer General Scott, played by Burt Lancaster. When Casey approaches the President with his suspicions, the President, played by Frederic March, is skeptical. But when all the facts are gathered before him there is no denying the obvious and the President is forced to act.

Edmund O'Brien is brilliant as the Southern Senator Raymond Clark. With his love of whiskey and spot on impersonation of a Southern Senator, he lends a sense of outrage to the plot that would destroy our system of government.

This film, along with The Manchurian Candidate" (the 1962 version) both shed light on what was really happening in the early 1960's in relation to the Cold War and our own politics here at home.

"Let's Face It" by Kirk Douglas

This is Kirk Douglas' last book. At least that's what he says. I doubt it. His memoirs, there are three, are filled with such warmth and wisdom, they make you want to read "just one more page, please?"

Drawing on his extraordinary career and family, he seems to still get a larger kick out of life at 90 than I do at age 55. He admits to whining a bit after his double knee surgery but is quick to acknowledge the gifts in the life that he has been privleged to lead.

Life is filled with lessons to be learned and Mr. Douglas is trying to learn them all before the end comes. And he is so adept at passing on some of the wisdom he has accumulated during his time with us.

No plot line to discuss here- just a great read from an author who has seen and done so much with his life.

The Ragman's Son by Kirk Douglas

From the opening line through to the last page this book is one of the most intimate and honest auto-biographies I have ever read.

Issur Danielovitch Demsky was born in Amsterdam, N.Y. to a Russian born "ragman."I still remember the ragman from my own neighborhood in Brooklyn, NY. He was a kindly,though somewhat mysterious figure. Imagine if that man was your father!

This book is the first of three that Kirk Douglas began in 1988. I have read all three. Follow Issurs'(Kirk Douglas) career through a childhood of poverty to his high school years and then World War Two.

Honest to a fault about everything, including his own shortcomings, this book will draw you into his life and thoughts. His confrontations with anti-semitism and his growing understanding of what it means to be Jewish contrast starkly with his name change. This is a complex man.

His movie years and 2 marriages are a good look at Hollywood and how it affects people and who they are. His insights into himself are what keep him searching for the meaning of all that has happened to him during his remarkable career.

I have always enjoyed Kirk Douglas as an actor. and as an author he shines with a light unique to Issur, the small boy who makes it big.