“When
I close my eyes, I see this thing, a sign, I see this name in bright blue neon
lights with a purple outline. And this name is so bright and so sharp that the
sign - it just blows up because the name is so powerful... It says, "Dirk
Diggler." – Eddie
Adams, Boogie Nights, 1997
This weekend was all about love for 35mm with a series of films being shown on film at the Prince Charles Cinema in association with Park Circus. I was lucky enough to intro the film for the screening and safe to say I was very nervous throughout the short films that featured HAIM called 'Valentine' that Paul Thomas Anderson shot last year. I spoke for a few minutes then darted back to my seat to enjoy the movie on the big screen, a first time for me.
Known as the movie about the Golden Age of
Porn, 1970s to 1980s, and about the infamous ‘Dirk Diggler’ who had a very
special member, Paul Thomas Anderson’s Boogie Night celebrates its 20th
anniversary this year.
Anderson’s second feature film stared out
as a short mockumentary film, ‘The Dirk Digger Story’ about the rise and fall
of a well-endowed porn star. The character was based on real porn star John
Holmes. Anderson then expanded his story about his ‘hero’ into Boogie Nights,
which follows the same story with Mark Wahlberg as the star, and follows other
characters in the porn industry as well and seeing how they cope with the
arrival of VHS tape, lower quality pictures, personal tragedies, joys and
relationships with each other.
There may be cast of colourful characters
but there is only one Dirk Diggler. Played by Mark Wahlberg, with just a few
roles under his belt, excluding his Marky Mark days of fame, Wahlberg made
Eddie Adams AKA Diggler his own creation. Diggler seems more than happy to take
on any challenge and, like most big decisions made by anyone in the film, is
unembellished in his delivery. Enthusiastic about his new lifestyle, keen to
share his ideas, he’s always ready to show his hidden talent at the drop of a
hat and he makes friends easily, but then again, so does everyone else in his
new ‘porn family’. Diggler was meant to be a porn star.
Focusing on an industry that is known more
for its negative aspects, the film plays upon the location and era in which it
is set. Critics have praised the film for showing an accurate representation of
the 70s and early 80s, with its attention to details in music, clothing and
behaviour, presenting the world that the characters live in, creating its sunny
Californian disposition with a side of seediness. Playing upon the lighter side
of events, the pool parties, days on the set, nights out disco dancing in the
Reseda night club, makes everything these characters do oh so glamourous, but
the darkness closes in scene by scene. A partygoer over doses on cocaine and is
dealt with in matter of fact way that feels uncomfortable as it is painfully
obvious that this happens all the time. Julianne Moore’s Amber Waves making
tearful phone calls to her son who she never gets to see. Burt Reynold’s Jack
Horner’s disillusion with the way his industry is heading and the yearning he
has to make a ‘real’ film. Characters start spiraling out of control until they
can’t take this situation anymore isn’t only reflected in the main cast. Supporting
characters illustrate the change of the times and non more poignant that
literal trigger point to the everyone’s downfalls, personal and professional is
the murder suicide of William H Macy’s Little Bill and his openly cheating
wife. The happier moments when the whole gang is on set making a movie, isn’t
juxtaposed with darker moments, the rise and fall isn’t just Dirk’s journey but
everyone he works with. Not quite book ending the film, the scenes of
filmmaking in production, the action porn film development and the end scene at
Horner’s house gives hope and a sense of a community repairing itself again.
From the moment ‘just a face in the crowd’
dishwasher Eddie not yet Dirk’s eye meets director Jack Horner’s across the
smoky sweaty room, everything slows down. This isn’t really love at first
sight, its most certainly lust, but the two go hand in hand throughout the
film. That spark between actor and director is what sets everything in motion
and its there that the audience is taken for a ride they won’t forget. No pun
intended.
