Thursday, July 08, 2021

Good Morning, World


We here at MNPP have been big fans of Dennis Haysbert (and yes, in that way) since childhood, when our father got us watching the Major League movies trying to drum up an interest in sports and instead just drummed up an interest in jocks instead. Specifically Dennis Haysbert in a jock. Turns out that sports, as a vehicle to jocks, can actually be good! Anyway smack dab in between the two Major League films, in the year 1993, Haysbert made a real strange little movie called Suture and well it might not get him in a jock (sad emoji) but it does spend some quality time staring at him all the same -- all of which I have now been able to document here in this post thanks to the film having just dropped this past week onto the Criterion Channel. Huzzah!

Have any of you seen Suture? Even though it got a fancy blu-ray release from Arrow a couple years back I hadn't even heard of it until Criterion highlighted it as part of their month-long "Neo-Noir" series (a series which is just one great film piled on top of another great film piled on top of another -- Body Heat! Manhunter! Body Double! The Eyes of Laura Mars! Chinatown! Blow Out! Blood Simple! Swoon!) but the Dennis-Haysbert of it all got me clicking right quick, and I found the film absolutely fascinating. Shot in sharp black-and-white the film introduces a pair of long-lost brothers, one black (Haysbert) and one white (Michael Harris), and then wraps a mistaken identity crime mystery around them which hinges on the fact that nobody in this world can tell the two of them apart. 

Color of their skin aside these two plainly look nothing alike. But that Bunuel-esque touch drops the floor out from our familiarity with what's possible in this place, and tinges everything with enough surreality -- as if the stepped-out-of-time cinematography wasn't already enough! -- to keep us unsure of our bearings. Anything seems possible when the construct of identity gets deconstructed -- this movie's like Psycho meets Persona. It's unsettling and kinda one-of-a-kind. I recommend seeking it out! And I also recommend you hit the jump for more gifs of Dennis Haysbert wearing a towel...


















3 comments:

Adam said...

I've seen it! Years ago though so I don't have much to add to the conversation lol

Anonymous said...

hot and hairy :)

Anonymous said...

Yessssssssss omg black and sexy