![\"jailhousecreole\"](\"http:\/\/smugfilm.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/04\/jailhousecreole.jpg\")
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Okay, we\u2019ve got the fluff out of the way and now we’re getting into\u00a0two of what are\u00a0hailed as Elvis’ greatest films.<\/p>\n
When last I saw you, I was\u00a0young and na\u00efve\u2014I had decided to undertake the project of watching every single film from Elvis’\u00a0shockingly large acting career. Now, four movies in, I would call this the blooming flower period for both Elvis and my Elvis enjoyment. We’ve got Jailhouse Rock<\/a>, probably Elvis’ most visually recognizable and iconic film\u2014if you’ve ever seen Elvis in a striped shirt, or dancing on a set that looks like a prison, it’s from Jailhouse Rock. Then we have King Creole<\/a>, which is an Elvis movie you\u2019ve probably heard of people having seen.<\/span><\/p>\n If you’re anything like me, you expect both of these to be the most Elvis-y Elvis movies imaginable\u2014full of hips, guitar licks, and sneering lips. But you hold some reservation too, since the first two were such let downs.<\/span><\/p>\n So what\u2019s the verdict? Well, keep reading and find out:<\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Woah, okay, Elvis just got real. This is like the mirrorverse version of Loving\u00a0You<\/a>\u2014no really,\u00a0it came out the same year.\u00a0It’s\u00a0a much darker origin story for\u00a0Elvis that gets surprisingly violent considering it’s\u00a0mostly an excuse to\u00a0showcase\u00a0pop music.<\/span><\/p>\n Elvis plays Vince Everett, a hotheaded\u00a0young\u00a0man who has major anger issues that\u00a0ends up beating a guy to death with\u00a0his\u00a0bare hands because he didn’t like how the guy was treating\u00a0some random chick.\u00a0While in the slammer, Vince gets a bad buzzcut\u00a0that somehow makes him look\u00a0 five years younger and learns how to play guitar from his ex-country musician\u00a0cellmate.\u00a0Realizing how much it pays, Vince decides to pursue a career in music\u00a0once he gets out of jail. With the help of an eager promoter (Judy Tyler)\u2013 and after breaking a guitar over a table and\u00a0slapping a record executive in the\u00a0face\u2013\u00a0Vince finally makes it big. However,\u00a0it’s lonely at the top when you’re kind\u00a0of a douche with a\u00a0big chip on your shoulder.\u00a0 <\/span><\/p>\n Jailhouse Rock is seriously dark!<\/i> Goodbye good-guy Elvis\u2014now he\u2019s straight up\u00a0lecherous and vindictive, with uncontrollable bursts of anger. I kind\u00a0of wish this\u00a0went even darker though, like maybe throw Robert Mitchum in there as the\u00a0other prisoner, or have Scorsese travel back in time and\u00a0direct. But as is, there ain’t no sunshine\u00a0in Jailhouse Rock\u2014Elvis kills a guy, punches a cop,\u00a0shits on Jazz music, uses\u00a0words like \u2018hell\u2019 and \u2018sexy\u2019, and\u00a0is, gasp, in the same bed as a lady <\/i>in the ’50s! It also\u00a0takes until Elvis gets literally\u00a0punched in the throat and given a tracheostomy for him to reconsider some of the choices he’s made in life\u2014I’m tellin’ ya, this is intense\u00a0shit.<\/span><\/p>\n What’s sort of interesting about this movie is how Elvis’ music\u00a0doesn’t seem like the focus. Whereas with the last two you were basically holding your breath until he sang again, with Jailhouse Rock you genuinely get into the\u00a0 anti-hero vibe. I was struck by the\u00a0fact that after Vince is\u00a0put on national television for a sort of prison talent show (P.S., can we bring\u00a0this back to television? That’s reality TV gold) he’s shown receiving hundreds of fan letters from women\u00a0that are just straight up like ‘Hey, I saw you in\u00a0prison, here are my measurements,\u00a0let\u2019s meet up when you’re done with the whole\u00a0 jail thing.’ I know that happens in real life occasionally, but dang, teenage girls\u2014you can do better.\u00a0 <\/span><\/p>\n Also, this is now the second movie in which Elvis is discovered by a woman who immediately makes it her job to promote him. I’m gonna keep tabs on that. There’s definitely an “older” woman taking care of Elvis theme in these films.<\/span><\/p>\n All in all, Jailhouse Rock is enjoyable, well-paced, and made Elvis seem like a\u00a0terrible person. Though you do get to see him work hard labor without his shirt\u00a0on, take a lady on a date to watch drag racing, eat a burger, and dance in a now\u00a0iconic jailhouse outfit, so it\u2019s definitely the most Elvis-y Elvis movie so far.<\/span><\/p>\n Best song:<\/b>\u00a0 It’s gotta\u00a0be “Jailhouse Rock<\/a>”\u00a0staged as a big elaborate made-for-TV\u00a0performance in which\u00a0Elvis tries his best to coordinate his dancing and lip-syncing and doesn’t\u00a0really succeed. This scene is apparently known as Elvis’\u00a0greatest moment\u00a0on film, but I don’t know, it’s not that impressive honestly. Elvis looks like he\u2019s making it up as he goes and everybody else is just following him. The movie covers for\u00a0it by having a character say at the end, \u201cLet\u2019s re-shoot, some dancers were out of\u00a0sync\u201d, and whether or not that line was always in there, or added after the fact because the performance was sub-par, it\u2019s telling.\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0The imagery is iconic and the song is great, I’ll give you that.<\/p>\n 3 out of 5 Stars<\/b><\/span><\/p>\n 4 out of 5 Elvises\u00a0 <\/b><\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0 \u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n King Creole<\/a> (1958) | 116 min.<\/b><\/span><\/p>\n Holy crap! Here we’ve got an actual plot, we’ve got\u00a0character motivations and\u00a0development, an incredibly solid musical score, and\u00a0some genuinely good\u00a0acting! Maybe I’m just this impressed because of\u00a0the substandard quality of the last three, but I think I may have just watched a legitimately great\u00a0film!<\/span><\/p>\n Danny Fischer (Presley) is a\u00a0hardworking teenager struggling to keep his\u00a0family afloat and maintain\u00a0passing grades. With his mother dead and his father\u00a0wallowing, it’s up to Danny to support the family. However, after flunking high\u00a0school a second time, he finds himself in a position to take a job as a singer at\u00a0the King Creole club.\u00a0Unfortunately, he also manages to get put on a watch list by local mobster and rival club owner\u00a0Maxie\u00a0Fields (Walter Matthau), the type of guy who won’t take no\u00a0for an answer. King\u00a0Creole follows Danny as he juggles his family, his job, and his two women\u2014the call\u00a0girl (Carolyn Jones) and the girl-next-door (Dolores Hart)\u2014all the while\u00a0grappling with his own search for direction and self understanding.\u00a0 <\/span><\/p>\n I didn’t realize until afterward, but I wasn’t surprised to learn King Creole was\u00a0directed by Michael Curtiz\u2014of course best known for directing\u00a0Casablanca<\/a>. This was supposedly Elvis’ favorite role, which makes sense, since the character is sympathetic\u00a0and recognizable. Fischer’s that sort of impatient kid\u00a0who would\u2019ve benefited from\u00a0having stronger parental guidance, but despite\u00a0his slightly unorthodox ways of getting ahead, managed to keep afloat with his strong sense of morals. I\u00a0can easily see this being something Elvis\u2014as a person, not an icon\u2014could\u00a0empathize with, even if I’m perhaps projecting\u00a0my own impression on him. Either way, he really kills it, acting-wise.<\/span><\/p>\n What’s great about this movie is how\u00a0well everybody and everything fits. Elvis doesn’t overact this one at all, plus\u00a0his music fits seamlessly with the plot.\u00a0There’s really no music relief breaks\u2014instead, he sings in appropriate situations and the songs move the story along. The plot\u00a0itself\u00a0is pretty great\u2014it’s a sad story about a talented kid\u00a0who’s been dealt a bum hand in life. There’s a real emphasis on how growing up\u00a0poor is an incredibly\u00a0hard obstacle that dictates the direction of the rest of your life\u2014even\u00a0somebody with unquestionable talent has no guarantees in life without\u00a0the money and time to back it up. But ultimately, King Creole isn’t a pity party;\u00a0Danny holds his own, and it throws just\u00a0as\u00a0much cynicism on those that na\u00efvely think they can\u00a0plan their futures\u2013such as Nellie (Hart),who’s ready to jump blindly into marriage, or Danny’s father (Dean Jagger) who has everything in place except a backbone.<\/span><\/p>\n The biggest faults of this movie are\u00a0the comparatively flatter female characters\u2014though, the sad helpless call girl\u00a0who doesn’t know how to get out of the hole she’s dug and the na\u00efve,\u00a0marriage-obsessed, bright-eyed innocent are believable\u00a0enough for the\u00a0time period.\u00a0Worse I think is the fact that there’s like only three black\u00a0people in all of\u00a0Louisiana according to this film, and all they do is sell street\u00a0food.\u00a0Fairly insulting, since just about all of the music in the film is straight up lifted\u00a0from\u00a0black artists, but hey, it was the ’50s, who’s surprised.<\/span><\/p>\n All in all, a great film. Not really Elvis-y, but that’s part of why it’s really well done.<\/span><\/p>\n Best Song: “<\/b>Trouble<\/a>,” definitely. A really satisfyingly shot scene in which Danny is first coerced on stage by Maxie, who suspects his supposed singing talent is actually just a lie. The song is shot perfectly\u2014the camera’s situated looking up at Danny on stage from the side, as if it were seated across from Maxie watching the entire scene unfold. And the song itself is badass\u2014Elvis starts out with his signature low-voiced talking, interspersed with trumpet crescendos until it all busts loose into Elvis tearing it up vocally and swinging his hips to match. Also pretty satisfying to watch Maxie wipe the egg off his face.<\/span><\/p>\n 4 out of 5 stars<\/b><\/span><\/p>\n 3 out of 4 Elvises<\/b><\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Back to Jenna Does Elvis #1<\/a> | Forward to Jenna Does Elvis #3<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Okay, we\u2019ve got the fluff out of the way and now we’re getting into\u00a0two of what are\u00a0hailed as Elvis’ greatest films.<\/p>\n When last I saw you, I was\u00a0young and na\u00efve\u2014I had decided to undertake the project of watching every single film from Elvis’\u00a0shocking large acting career. Now, four movies in, I would call this the blooming flower period for both Elvis and my Elvis enjoyment. We’ve got Jailhouse Rock<\/a>, probably Elvis’ most visually recognizable and iconic film\u2014if you’ve ever seen Elvis in a striped shirt, or dancing on a set that looks like a prison, it’s from Jailhouse Rock. Then we have King Creole<\/a>, which is an Elvis movie you\u2019ve probably heard of people having seen.<\/span><\/p>\n If you’re anything like me, you expect both of these to be the most Elvis-y Elvis movies imaginable\u2014full of hips, guitar licks, and sneering lips. But you hold some reservation too, since the first two were such let downs.<\/span><\/p>\n So what\u2019s the verdict? Well, keep reading and find out:<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[25,2563],"tags":[4682,750,4681,4688,4664,4680,4685,4687,4780,4631,4686,4577,4717,4633,4632,4581,4576,594,5099,4580,4579,3945,104,4684,4683],"class_list":["post-6063","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-allposts","category-jennas-reviews","tag-carolyn-jones","tag-casablanca","tag-dolores-hart","tag-elvis-club-singer","tag-elvis-hips","tag-elvis-jail","tag-elvis-louisiana","tag-elvis-mob","tag-elvis-movie-review","tag-elvis-movie-reviews","tag-elvis-new-orleans","tag-elvis-presley","tag-elvis-presley-movie-review","tag-elvis-presley-movie-reviews","tag-elvis-review","tag-jailhouse-rock","tag-jenna-does-elvis","tag-jenna-ipcar","tag-jennas-reviews","tag-king-creole","tag-loving-you","tag-michael-curtiz","tag-smug-film-2","tag-trouble","tag-walter-matthau"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/smugfilm.com\/oldsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6063","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/smugfilm.com\/oldsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/smugfilm.com\/oldsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/smugfilm.com\/oldsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/smugfilm.com\/oldsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6063"}],"version-history":[{"count":12,"href":"https:\/\/smugfilm.com\/oldsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6063\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6441,"href":"https:\/\/smugfilm.com\/oldsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6063\/revisions\/6441"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/smugfilm.com\/oldsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6063"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/smugfilm.com\/oldsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6063"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/smugfilm.com\/oldsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6063"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"jailhouse\"](\"http:\/\/smugfilm.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/04\/jailhouse.jpg\")
\u00a0<\/a><\/span>Jailhouse Rock<\/a> (1957) | 96 min.<\/b><\/p>\n![\"elvis1small\"](\"http:\/\/smugfilm.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/04\/elvis1small.jpg\")
<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n![\"creole\"](\"http:\/\/smugfilm.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/04\/creole.jpg\")
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