83 The Harder They Come

[milk114]

The Harder They Come



Reggae superstar Jimmy Cliff is Ivan, a rural Jamaican musician who journeys to the city of Kingston in search of fame and fortune. Pushed to desperate circumstances by shady record producers and corrupt cops, he finally achieves notoriety— as a murderous outlaw. Boasting some of the greatest music ever produced in Jamaica, The Harder They Come brought the catchy and subversive rhythms of the rastas to the U.S. in the early '70s. Criterion is proud to present this underground classic in a new Director Approved special edition.

Special Features

• Widescreen digital transfer, supervised by writer-director Perry Henzell
• Audio commentary by Perry Henzell and star Jimmy Cliff
• Exclusive video interview with Island Records founder Chris Blackwell
• Illustrated bio-discographies on the film's contributing musicians
• English subtitles for the deaf and hearing impaired

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Last week I picked this up at the local Borders bookstore (though they're higher priced than online they're below retail, and till the end of this month buy 3 dvds the fourth is free, so it ended up cheaper ever so slightly than buying four online) though this has no bearing on whether its out of print or not.

After just watching it I must say this is a great film and a great disc in my opinion. I dont have any fancy set-up so for me the picture and sound were great. I sampled the commentary and it seemed well done and informative. The Chris Blackwell interview is also informative and interesting (I didn't know he, the founder of Island Records, is also the founder of Palm Pictures). Fortunately subtitles aren't burned but optional (and often necessary).

The film is great. As Blackwell said in his interview, its a film made for Jamaicans which makes it so "exotic" to anglo, western eyes (mine). It very much falls in line with sub-Saharan African films I've seen that are focused their identity. Along those lines the film blends US film genres into something unique. Its a ganster action film with comedy and social critique. Though not new in and of itself, the style is more similar to African films than US films.

The critique is most interesting when dealing with the power of "western" cinema itself on the psyche of Jamaicans. I don't want to spoil anything but one of the first things Ivan wants to do when landing in Kingston from the countryside is go see a movie. The images of Django (I now must see this movie!) effect Ivan more than anything in his life. Its interesting how "western" films serve as a colonial tool after colonialism is officially over.

The soundtrack is great as well and two or three of the songs are repeated over and over and over, mainly the Jimmy Cliff (the star)'s own songs, especially "The Harder They Come" and "You can get it if you really want" but there are different "styles," if you will, of reggae present with differing moods. What's great is that though the film may seem to glorify violence the music serves as a counterpoint, especially "you can get it if you really want." The Jamaican music industry and law enforcement are also criticized throughout the film, among other areas of society.

I would definitely recommend this film be viewed over and over again. I don't really know what the 30th anniversary edition is supposed to offer but I can't see it being much better than this CC edition. It's a great film, though it makes me wish there were more like it coming from the Caribbean. The Harder They Come is more than worthy of a blind buy.

[milk114]

I am curious if there are other films that deal so explicitly with the impact of cinema, western or otherwise, on the audiences' psyches. The scene in the cinema reminded me of The Last Dragon. What's interesting is I was talking with an Indian historian and he said that Django, the film within The Harder They Come, was hugely popular and successful in India, where he snuck in at a young age to see it multiple times. I wonder what it is about this particular spaghetti western that fascinated Indian audiences as well as Jamaican audiences and if it was also successful elsewhere.

I know there are films about filmmaking that critique the "industry" but what other films exist that show audience response and interaction with filmviewing experience, especially after the lights come up and every leaves the theater?

[leo goldsmith]

I am curious if there are other films that deal so explicitly with the impact of cinema, western or otherwise, on the audiences' psyches....

I know there are films about filmmaking that critique the "industry" but what other films exist that show audience response and interaction with filmviewing experience, especially after the lights come up and every leaves the theater?

Sherlock Jr. is a great film about film reception, though probably not in the way you mean. Still, it's a lot of fun and fairly subtle, and it seems to initiate a cycle of films that deal with the impact of movies and pop culture on the audience. I also always think of "lovers on the run" films, like Badlands, Wild at Heart, and (somewhat differently) Pierrot le fou, which all deal more or less explicitly with this kind of reception and claiming of pop culture iconography. I'm sure there are a host of examples from HK cinema, too.

But of course, what makes The Harder They Come so interesting is that it not only narrates this kind of impact of cinema on an audience, it also embodies the kind of hero-worship it describes; it not only shows how Ivan and the film audience respond to/adopt/translate the Django/hero figure, it also enacts the hero-worship and mythologization of Ivan's character (if that makes any sense).

[hearthesilence]

Ever read Greil Marcus's "Mystery Train"? Not everyone likes his criticism, especially in recent years, but "Mystery Train" is widely acknowledged as a classic, possibly the best written by a rock critic.

It's been awhile, but I believe there's a chapter written on the myth of 'Stagger Lee' and its place in American culture and pop music, particularly in the music of Sly & the Family Stone. I can't remember if this film was singled out, I think it was, but it's definitely worth reading if you've seen this film.

The soundtrack is also amazing, one of the best of all-time, PERIOD (not just among reggae albums or soundtrack albums). Try to get the older CD version, which was mastered better. The most recent re-issue was done poorly - a lot of extra compression, harsh, bright EQ, and flanging/phasey artifacts on the mono recording, "Shanty Town," which was played back incorrectly (they made the same mistake on the original Lp, but it's not like that on the original 45 nor the older CD; "Shanty Town" was one of a handful of previously released songs compiled for the soundtrack).

[zedz]

I know there are films about filmmaking that critique the "industry" but what other films exist that show audience response and interaction with filmviewing experience, especially after the lights come up and every leaves the theater?

Two great films from opposite sides of the dramatic spectrum: Tati's Jour de Fete and Erice's Spirit of the Beehive. There's also a wonderful documentary short from the sixties (by Octavio Paz, I think) called Por Primera Vez, which records the arrival of cinema in a tiny mountain village in the Andes. A similar scene concludes the brilliant Australian documentary First Contact.

Actually, the more I think about it, the more spring to mind: Sullivan's Travels; The Long Day Closes; Tsai's Goodbye, Dragon Inn, which may be the ultimate dissection of the filmgoing (or at least cinema-visiting) experience.

[colinr0380]

I was just watching through some of my old videos and came across the Moviedrome showing of The Harder They Come from 1994. I thought it might be worth typing out Alex Cox's introduction to the film:

Tonight on Moviedrome - the ultimate music related, non-rockumentary, cult classic. The Saturday late night show par excellence - The Harder They Come, made in 1972 in Jamaica. The film, as you probably know stars reggae genius Jimmy Cliff in the role of Ivan, an aspiring young Jamaican musician who plans to make it as a reggae star.

It features one of the most exciting musical tracks of any feature film, encapsulating with a selection of really great hits a musical moment, just as Dennis Hopper's Easy Rider and Colors soundtracks did or The Pistols soundtrack for Julien Temple's The Great Rock 'n' Roll Swindle.

The Harder They Come features music by Toots and The Maytals, Jimmy Cliff, Desmond Dekker and The Slickers. The songs include Many Rivers To Cross, Johnny Too Bad, You Can Get It If You Really Want and of course the title track, The Harder They Come.

As a soundtrack it ranks with American Grafitti, The Big Chill, The Graduate and Midnight Cowboy. Not only does The Harder They Come feature a great soundtrack, it also manages to be a great film as well. The director Perry Henzell was a graduate of the BBC, this is his first film.

The Harder They Come is sort of the career of a social bandit, like Bonnie and Clyde or Salvatore Giuliano. At the same time, and this is both Cliff's and Henzell's brilliance, there are no false notes, no dubious mythologising. When Ivan is taken to jail, he is scared. He is violent and mysoginistic. He has a very romantic notion of himself as a Robin Hood character. At one point, Moviedrome regulars will note, he goes to see Sergio Corbucci's spaghetti western Django at the Rialto Cinema in Kingston. The film impresses him so much that he actually identifies with Django (aka Franco Nero), in the final showdown.

Kids! Do not attempt these feats in your own home! Do not become a ganja dealing gangster or a rock and roll musician. Do not drag a gatling gun around in a coffin or, if you must, avoid gun-toting maniacs and fast flowing rivers of mud. Remain glued to your television, unbemused by the distinction between reality and unreality as Moviedrome presents the first Jamaican feature film, the first original classic of cult reggae cinema - The Harder They Come.

[zedz]

Thanks for going to the trouble of doing that, Colin.

But:

The Harder They Come features music by Toots and The Mayflowers

I guess this was the Maytals in their 'British Invasion' period.

[colinr0380]

whoops! have amended it! music is really not my forte!

[Godot]

...what other films exist that show audience response and interaction with filmviewing experience, especially after the lights come up and every [sic] leaves the theater?

The Last Picture Show
A Little Romance
Play It Again, Sam
The Purple Rose of Cairo
Hannah and Her Sisters
Annie Hall
Stranger Than Paradise
A Clockwork Orange (thematically)

[Jun-Dai]

(this really belongs in another thread, I'm sure)

Celebrity
Singin' in the Rain
O Brother Where Art Thou?
Mystery Science Theater 3000

in a different sort of way:
Sunset Boulevard
Peeping Tom

[oldsheperd]

Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid

[leo goldsmith]

Uh-oh, list time!

On further reflection, I think there's something very specific about this film's relation to film reception, and perhaps this is what Milk is getting at. Ivan (and by extension, the film as a whole) adopts the symbolism of the Django character in his own process of self-mythologization. What is doubly interesting is that, unlike many European (and other) filmmakers, Henzell does not go back to the roots of this iconography (John Ford, John Wayne, etc.), but points to the spaghetti western, which is itself a refraction/translation of the original (American) mythos. I think this is particularly important because it not only points to the specific quality of cinema as an international medium (and its reception by different audiences in different countries), but as this is also the "first" (is this really true?) Jamaican feature, it embodies the creation of a national cinema through this process of translation.

I'd venture that this is something quite a bit more nuanced than what one might find in, say, MST3K.

[Jun-Dai]

I don't know. I don't think it's all that nuanced. Certainly the film has a lot to say about mythologizing people, and people mythologizing themselves, but the connection between Ivan and Django, both as he views himself, and as he has come to be viewed by his sympathizers, could hardly be less subtle. While MST3K might not be the best point of comparison (though you could probably develop some pretty sophisticated theories about it's very existence--it is, after all, pretty much a singular phenomenon), certainly the Desmond's own self-worship bears some resemblance to Ivan's, and is more subtle and intricate. Or a still more nuanced point might be the relationship between Don Lockwood and his audience.

Also, is John Wayne really the origin of this sort of mythos? It seems to me that Westerns are really just (relatively) new wrapping paper for much older stories. I think we were already running out of heroes at that point, and the Western setting gave us a new opportunity to revive the hero idea for one last time (barring a smattering of wartime heroes and reworkings of old-fashioned stories).

[leo goldsmith]

I don't know. I don't think it's all that nuanced. Certainly the film has a lot to say about mythologizing people, and people mythologizing themselves, but the connection between Ivan and Django, both as he views himself, and as he has come to be viewed by his sympathizers, could hardly be less subtle.

I don't think the self-mythologizing is, in itself, particularly nuanced. What I think is nuanced (or at least suggestive/provocative/worth discussing) is its relation to ideas of international film distribution and reception, as well as the film's particular status as the "first" Jamaican film. The film seems intended (or at least critically framed) as the inception of a national cinema, and that this cinema is founded on a specifically foreign film genre (as filtered through yet another country's sensibility) says something about the medium of film and the use of film in constructing national identities. It's also interesting that Ivan and the members of the audience react to and comment upon Django (shades of MST3K?) and indeed even discuss how such films are supposed to end. Of course, The Harder They Come ends in a notably different way.

While MST3K might not be the best point of comparison (though you could probably develop some pretty sophisticated theories about it's very existence--it is, after all, pretty much a singular phenomenon), certainly the Desmond's own self-worship bears some resemblance to Ivan's, and is more subtle and intricate. Or a still more nuanced point might be the relationship between Don Lockwood and his audience.

Indeed. I will confess to not knowing much about MST3K, but I still wonder what it has in common with The Harder They Come beyond the simple fact that each incorporates scenes of moviegoing. There are obviously loads of films that incorporate similar scenes. My argument is that The Harder They Come does this in a very specific manner for very specific reasons (as, I'm sure, MST3K does in its own way). And without wanting to valorize one over the other, I do wonder whether MST3K's approach to issues of film reception is really as complex as The Harder They Come's. But that's almost certainly a subject for a different thread.

Also, is John Wayne really the origin of this sort of mythos? It seems to me that Westerns are really just (relatively) new wrapping paper for much older stories.

John Wayne is not necessarily the progenitor, but the Western genre has specific contours that separate it from other mythologies. Of course, one can subscribe to the Joseph Campbell way of thinking and say that all of these stories are simply versions of the same story, but that doesn't change the fact that the Western is a discernible type of mythology from a very specific historical/geographic context with a very special place with respect to film.

[Simon]

According to the Criterion newsletter, this goes out of print in september.

[Lemdog]

This really isn't much of a surprise. We've been expecting this for 2 years now.

[milk114]

why have we been expecting this?

[The Fanciful Norwegian]

The other version's been out for so long that I imagine a lot of people assumed it wouldn't have any effect on the Criterion. I was certainly surprised to hear it was going out of print; I figured that if it was going to go OOP it would've been either before or shortly after the release of the Xenon version, not two and a half years later.

[cdnchris]

There's apparently a remake coming out. Might that have something to do with it (At least I think it's a remake, it has the same title and everything...)

I think it's being remade with a "hip-hop" theme, though.

[Buttery Jeb]

I think various remakes of "Harder They Come" has been in pre-production for a couple decades now. I remember when there was talk about one starring Wycliff Jean in the lead back when the Fugees first dropped, but it fell through as Perry Henzel was working on a psuedo-sequel at the time, with Jimmy Cliff passing the torch to a new generation of artists. Or something to that effect.

Until I hear otherwise, I'll just assume that Criterion lost the rights, and Xeneon's kept their's. The original DVD wasn't bad, but it definitely suffered from the usual early Criterion DVD malaise.

-BJ

[colinr0380]

The original DVD wasn't bad, but it definitely suffered from the usual early Criterion DVD malaise.

-BJ

I was also thinking that they had not bothered with this release. After watching the film I wanted to know more and a commentary with Jimmy Cliff or Perry Henzell would have been great - but nothing! I was surprised that they could not be bothered to include a commentary, interview or even an an essay on the disc. Shame on you Criterion -
shame-on-you!

But seriously if it is a malaise then it is one that I wish more disc producers would catch! And it might have been better if they had caught it at the same time (2000) rather than only now beginning to wake up to producing better quality discs - the fact that these early DVDs are remembered while other releases from other companies at the time are less well known is perhaps a testament to the quality, which inevitably has been surpassed over the last five years by more recent releases. It might be better if one of the other Criterions without any extra features whatsoever were used to describe this 'malaise'!

[Martha]

And in non-OOP Harder They Come news, a music site called Earvolution lists Cliff's soundtrack to the film as one of their 20 most underrated rock albums. (Normally I ignore these things, but since they remember Tin Machine, I'm prepared to cut whoever these people are some slack.)

[dx23]

And in non-OOP Harder They Come news, a music site called Earvolution lists Cliff's soundtrack to the film as one of their 20 most underrated rock albums. (Normally I ignore these things, but since they remember Tin Machine, I'm prepared to cut whoever these people are some slack.)

Pretty nice list. Thumbs up for the Traveling Wilburys mention.

[Billy Liar]

And in non-OOP Harder They Come news, a music site called Earvolution lists Cliff's soundtrack to the film as one of their 20 most underrated rock albums. (Normally I ignore these things, but since they remember Tin Machine, I'm prepared to cut whoever these people are some slack.)

It's not Cliff's soundtrack though. The funny thing about the music is the best tracks on the album are by the other artists such as The Slickers, Maytals and not forgetting Scotty's sublime DJ cut to the all time classic Studio 1 monster Stop That Train.

Cliff's music to me represents the watered down reggae style that takes all of the heart and soul out of the music. It's a cross-over reggae trying to appeal to pop buying public.

It's not a 'great' album, but a nice introduction into the wonderfull world of reggae.

[zedz]

It's not Cliff's soundtrack though. The funny thing about the music is the best tracks on the album are by the other artists such as The Slickers, Maytals and not forgetting Scotty's sublime DJ cut to the all time classic Studio 1 monster Stop That Train.

The footage of the Maytals in the studio is the highlight of the film for me. I just wish there was more of them in there.