161. Liberty Heights

Song - Brown Eyed Girl (Van Morrison)

Movie: Liberty Heights (Barry Levinson, 1999)

"I still remember the first time I kissed Sylvia, or the last time I hugged my father before he died." So tells us Ben Kurtzman (Ben Foster) in the film's closing voice-over. I found this an interesting choice of words. We see Ben and Sylvia's first kiss in the film. It occurs during their high school ceremony, following which it's unlikely they will see each other again. Ben, the first of his Jewish family to go to college, will attend the University of Baltimore, while Sylvia (Rebekah Johnson) will follow her family tradition to go to Spelman, the oldest private black liberal arts college in America. Both families are scandalised by the interracial kiss they see at the ceremony. The Kurtzmans are already fragile anyway, as Ben's father Nate (Joe Mantegna) is about to face a 10-year jail sentence for employing prostitutes in his flailing burlesque. It's a sad ending to this film, but the wonderfully subtle wording in that closing voice-over offers a glimpse of hope, suggesting that Ben got to hug his father after getting out of jail, and that he kissed Sylvia more than once. 

It's easy to wish that things turn out well for these people. The film's view of segregated 1955 America is so bleak it makes you sympathise with anyone who had to navigate that society. It shows how ingrained segregation was in every aspect of society, how unnatural it was, and how incompatible with the emerging youth culture. It's very easy to see how in that context a teenage Jewish boy could be confused enough to dress up as Adolf Hitler for Halloween. It's quite startling to see Ben dressed in full Nazi-regalia angrily yell at his stunned parents (and grandmother) for not letting him go out of the house like that. Levinson lets the whole scene play out longer than it needs to and ads a 'coda' in which a still uniformed Ben laughs his ass off at some TV-show he watches. It's a scene that is deliberately I think a little bit exploitative and distasteful, as it makes the scenes in which Ben's parents are equally angry at him for showing affection to a black girl only more unsettling. They would not be angry if he comes home with a non-Jewish white girl, but many public spaces where he can find one are closed for "Dogs, Jews or Colored". And as his brother Van (Adrien Brody) experiences, at 'gentile' parties he and his firends either end up beaten or emotionally manipulated. 

Van's struggles lead to a subplot that lays its critique of confused 1950's masculinity on a bit too thick, while also being slightly sexist itself. Part of the problem is that Levinson approaches this subplot as if he is making a heightened and lush 1950's melodrama, which is not a bad idea, but it doesn't at all fit the style of the rest of the film, while Brody and model Carolyn Murphy are acting in completely different modes, none of which evoke the mood, period and emotions Levinson is going for. But even if they did, their subplot is so silly and tone-deaf that it wouldn't matter much. Much better are the scenes between Ben and Sylvia, who find that all perceived differences between white and black people vanish at a James Brown concert. The film makes a good case for art, in particular music, as a powerful tool of integration, in both content and form; The soundtrack consists of songs which are famous for having a specific connection to a particular culture. Often one of these songs will kick in when 'its' culture is depicted on screen, but will then continue into a scene in which another culture is depicted. I'm not gonna pretend that this is particularly groundbreaking, but I did like it. Which is also a good summary of the film and Barry Levinson's career as a whole. As a teen I thought Wag the Dog was one of the greatest thing ever. It's not, but it sure would be nice if there was more room nowadays for films like it, Tin Men and Diner.