*contains spoilers
[published on July 22, 2006 at "The Flatland Oracles," my previous website.
Can I be honest? I am not a big fan of Peter Sellers. With the exception of one or two of The Pink Panther series, I didn't find most of his films amusing when they were made and I don't find them, including most of The Pink Panther series, amusing now. While Nick venerates Sellers, his films seem to me to be hopelessly dated. I didn't even like Being There all that much.
With one shining exception: The Party, a 1968 Blake Edwards film which many of Sellers' dedicated fans seem never to have heard of.
Now at first blush, for me to adore The Party is clearly politically incorrect. In this film, Sellers plays Hrundi V. Bhakshi, a gentle Bollywood actor (of the "Goodness Gracious me!" variety) imported to Hollywood to play Gunga Din in an epononymous film.
When I first saw the film, I thought, "Right. Here's the stereoptypical [particularly in that period] obsequious Indian who speaks in 'hilarious' sing-song and malapropisms." The only reason I sat through it was because I was watching it with friends. You might think the same thing initially if you are not warned in advance.
So wait. Seriously, wait. Give it time. There really IS more to this film than meets the eye. Mr. Bhakshi, being Indian as well as a very minor actor, really is the ultimate outsider. He's me. He's also you. He's the unpopular kid at fraternity Rush who isn't going to be chosen but doesn't seem to get it He's the poor relation at the family feast. Though overly endowed with humility and the tendency to apologize if caught out in a blunder, he really does NOT realize that he's totally out of his depth. But as the party wears on, you start to realize that he is the one person among the depthless 'celebrities' present who has anything on the window shelves behind the shop window. This happens very slowly, but it definitely happens.
The first 5 or 10 minutes of the film (before the roll of the credits) yields---to me, anyway---some of the funniest footage in history, which takes place on the set of the film in which he's starring. After he gently, naively, heedlessly destroys take after take and ultimately, the entire set, the frothing director of course bellows , "YOU'LL NEVER WORK IN THIS TOWN AGAIN".
BHAKSHI (after a moment's bemusement) "Does that.... include television, sir?"
Exit, pursued by an irate director.
Cut to the office of the humorless, cigar-chomping boss of the studio Mr. Clutterbuck. "What? What? The WHOLE DAMN THING? ...Well, what's his name?... I'll see to it he never works in this town again!" Furious at the loss of his set, he jots down the soon-to-be-fired Mr. Bhakshi's name on what he thinks is a piece of scratch paper. Instead, it's the edge of a carefully typed-out guest list for a celebrity-studded party at his mansion. He hands the list over to his secretary with an order to send out the invitations. All this before the opening credits.
So then---in what I have always thought was one of the film's most telling moments----you see Mr. Bhakshi at home. He is tuning his sitar. This, I have always thought, was the portrait of Mr. Bhakshi's true self: dignified, tranquil, apparently unabashed by his humiliating ejection from the set, intent on making music. The postman knocks; Mr. Bhakshi pads to the door to receive it. He opens it solemnly and reads it without surprise. He begins to prepare for the party. The opening credits roll, accompanied by a particularly bouncy Henry Mancini theme featuring sitars.
The rest of the film all takes place at the party. Mr. Bhakti tools up in his tiny three-wheeled car, pulls in behind the limos, and is ushered in, eagerly friendly, anxious to make a good impression, but with insufficient attention to the fact that he is out of his depth and swimming with the sharks. His fatal flaw (from the standpoint of the assembled guests) is his humility; most of them write him off as of no importance. His real fatal flaws are his self-consciousness, which is inseparable from his humility, which is inseparable from his dignity, which is inseparable from his innocence. Fortunately, he has a childlike resilience in the face of humiliation and social catastrophe and limitless good humor that see him through.
Co-starring in the film is his hosts' horrible 1970's 'house of the future,' where everything is stupidly automated; and things like a giant fireplace in the middle of the room can be activated by the push of a button. A babbling brook runs through the house. All of this is as grass before the scythe of Mr. Bhakshi's inadvertent attempts to avoid the consequences of his many naive blunders.
For example: Rebuffed by the other guests, Mr. Bhakshi removes himself from the center of the party and begins fiddling with one of those intriguing-looking buttons and nearly roasts several of the guests alive. And so on. He ultimately destroys his relentless enemy the house (though certainly not intentionally).
In the interim, no social catastrophe can daunt him, or not for long; he rises above the chaos that he constantly, invariably creates. The chaos arises not so much because of his constant social blunders as a result of his painful struggles to conceal them or to avert the consequences. Each attempt to avert disaster causes an equal reaction in the opposite direction.
The party unfolds in real time. From the time the credits end to the conclusion of the film, the whole film is the party. One of my friends found it 'slow.' I think the pace is just right. It's a party!
As Mr. Bhakshi stumbles through the evening, his superiority to those present begins to shine through. First, you notice his sweet nature and touching humility. Later on, though, you start to see his dignity and admirable character. The surface stereotype crumbles away. We witness the budding (only that) of a charming friendship between Mr. Bhakshi and a French starlet played by a luminous Claudine Longet. He stands up---albeit in a most non-western way----to C.S. Divot (Gavin McCleod)---the producer of Mr. Bhakshi's film, and a casting couch pig. (Mr. Bhakshi's display of eastern-style courage is subtly contrasted to excellent effect with the western style of courage displayed on the big screen by Mr. Bhakshi's film idol, a rhinestone cowboy called "Wyoming Bill" Kelso.)
The viewer's first impression of Mr. Bhakshi crumble away, along with the host's house and patience. Through it all, there is much MUCH music by Henry Mancini. Like it or not, the sprightly background plinking and strumming (provided in the film by the hired band) definitely conveys the feeling of a period cocktail party. You can practically smell the martini olives and the Breck shampoo.
There is one character who almost steals the whole show out from under Seller's a nameless and mainly silent martini-swilling waiter who consumes all the drinks that Mr. Bhakshi declines and stolidly soldiers on.
I stumbled on this film in the late Nineties while trolling the aisles of my local Blockbuster in search of comedy. I'm fond enough of this film that I watch it at least a couple of times a year. I watched it one dismal New Year's Eve when I was visiting my mother; my husband had just died, I didn't want to do anything but sleep, but my mother dragged me over to her friend Howard's to get me out of the house. I had brought the film with me from home because my mom had asked me to. I didn't want to see it again particularly, but since it was her evening and I didn't care much about anything, I went along for the ride.
It was an unqualified success. While I won't claim it took me out of myself, it was curiously comforting. At first I got my enjoyment, such as it was, of anticipating the moments that would make my mother laugh, but pretty soon I was laughing along too. The film reminded me, among other things, that a person with an innate sense of dignity can retain it through the worst of times, including the most egregious social embarrassments.
Unlike contemporary films, it doesn't conclude with an unambiguous triumph by Mr. Bhakshi over those who undervalued or disliked him. As in life, he doesn't win it all. But the ending is amusing and affirming and very true to life. Most important, this rather undervalued Sellers film is FUNNY ALL THE WAY THROUGH.
If you are in need of being taken out of yourself, or if you just like to laugh, or if you are a Sellers fan who missed this one, you will love this film.
Comments