Z Channel - A Magnificent Obsession

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You Never Know When You're Living in a Golden Age, 2008-08-11
I first caught this documentary on IFC not knowing what I was seeing but fascinated by the incredible array of clips. Imagine my surprise when this seeming ode to movie-love turned very dark indeed and Jerry Harvey went over the edge killing his wife and himself. I knew I had to chase this movie down and get the whole story. br / br /In some ways the story of Z Channel and Jerry Harvey is the story of cineaphilia going mainstream, from the art house to your house. It was a movie channel programmed by people who love movies and the joy of helping to bring these movies to a wider public comes alive in the interviews and in the commentary track. It's a delightfully unsnobbish love, too; one that encompasses Antonioni, Fassbinder and Silver Streak. br / br /Of course, that's the Magnificent part. The tragic obsession lay within the troubled mind of Jerry Harvey. It's an all to familiar story of a person who appears to be perhaps a bit eccentric yet overall a decent guy. The sad affection in which many interviewees still hold Harvey is palpable. Many remain bewildered by his ultimate tragic acts but they don't give him a pass, their anger is present too. br / br /Cassavettes tells this story simply with interviews with people who worked at Z, were impacted by Z, and/or knew Jerry Harvey. Intercut among the interviews are small clips of Z Channel movies and, most eerily, a radio interview with Jerry Harvey. br / br /One interviewee remarks that perhaps this story has gone untold for so long because no one want to risk creating a hero where perhaps none was warranted. To my mind Cassavettes does a fine job of honoring Z Channel while painting the darkness that inevitably swallowed up Harvey. What caused that darkness will probably never be fully known, only that it lead to a tragedy that no amount of great programming could ever excise. br / br /Highly recommended for film buffs and documentary fans. br / br /Note: If you can, get the 2 Disc version. It features two extra "chapters", a montage of Z Magazines and the complete Desert Disks interview with Jerry Harvey.

1 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

I wouldn't mine working for the Z Channel, 2007-08-21
Any true movie lover will squeal in delight while watching Z Channel: A Magnificent Obsession, a documentary about an obscure television station and the unfortunate end that came to it. The Velvet Underground of movie channels, very few people in the world actually watched Channel Z, but the few that did went on to change the medium itself. Watching the movie will likely bring out three emotions in you: a remembrance of why you love film so much; a disbelief that such a daring channel actually existed; and a sadness that the time is gone forever where a cable channel could run a festival of uncut Antonioni films and actually get away with it. Director Xan Cassavetes, daughter of actor-director John and actress Gena Rowlands, grew up watching the HBO precursor in her Los Angeles home, as did so many who have gone on to become influential Hollywood figures. Quentin Tarantino, Alexander Payne and Jim Jarmusch are just a few of the directors that Cassavetes simply points a camera at and lets them geek out, so to speak. Others, like James Woods, Robert Altman and Paul Verhoeven, line up to admit that the channel largely handed them their careers once it took them under its wing and started showing their work in heavy rotation. br / br /Who started this? Station's Director Jerry Harvey. He was an eccentric film-obsessed savant who readily referred to himself as insane. A compulsive worker, Harvey made Z Channel (launched in 1974) his own never-ending film festival, and his efforts eventually left the man an exhausted, bitter alcoholic with an ominous pattern of spousal abuse. In 1988, Jerry Harvey shot his wife to death and, after an hour of sitting there and thinking about his actions, turned the gun on himself. br / br /Z Channel walks a tightrope in not glorifying Harvey, but by simply giving us the details and letting us get as confused by his personality as those around him were. He was a complicated man, one who could be your best friend one minute and spewing vitriol in your direction the next. Through interviews with friends, ex-lovers and associates, Cassavetes paints the picture of a man who fanatically took charge of one tiny part of the world because it was the only thing during his lifetime that he seemed able to control. The documentary doesn't allow itself to get dragged down, however, by the grim end that befell a channel that once had HBO quivering in its boots. It prefers to show us long, extended clips from many of the daring films that Z Channel trumpeted. Things like Penelope Spheeris' "Decline of Western Civilization Part 1," or "Zulawski's The Important Thing is to Love," or "Stuart Cooper's Overlord." These are worthwhile films that few have even had the opportunity to see, and for a brief period of time Z Channel was shooting them into your living room every night alongside such hardcore fare as the five hour cut of Bertolucci's "1900" and similar extended versions of Cimino's "Heaven's Gate" and Leone's "Once Upon a Time in America." br / br /Z Channel invented the 'Director's Cut,' it could be argued, just as possibly as it invented the cable movie channel and the independent film explosion of the mid-1990's. This is a channel worth remembering, and a documentary that does a fine job of preserving the vague memories that survive. This is partly due to the way Cassavetes intersperses enlightening interviews with footage from the films that must have been a nightmare to secure all the rights for. The movie is also considerably enhanced by a creepy radio interview that Harvey once gave, sullenly discussing his life's work while it sounds like he already has his finger on the trigger. When the time comes to deal with Harvey's horrific final actions, Cassavetes and her interview subjects handle the situation appropriately - with shock, anger and sadness, but never an attempt to turn the man into something more than he was. br / br /The only thing holding Z Channel back from being a better film is its lack of budget, which would explain the History Channel-technique of reusing the same shot every few minutes and hoping the audience doesn't notice. Weak re-creations of leaves blowing in a field or grainy footage of Jerry's old house will stick in your mind after the film, but only because you saw each about five times during the movie. Also, it would have been nice to see some interviews with a few of the HBO people who eventually brought the channel down, and Cassavetes misses a powerful opportunity when she drops in the mysterious vanishing of Harvey's sister but never tells us what became of her. In the end, Z Channel is a movie that Z Channel would have shown. I can't think of any higher compliment to give it than that. br /

1 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

Z Channel: A Magnificent Obsession, 2007-07-30
Cassavetes's evocative, unsettling portrait sheds as much light on the maverick early days of cable programming as it does on the passionate, deeply troubled Harvey, a man fondly recalled by directors like Robert Altman and Michael Cimino for airing their least-known and riskiest movies. Others, like Quentin Tarantino, Alexander Payne, and Jim Jarmusch, simply enthuse about how eye-opening it was to see exotic fare by Peckinpah and Verhoeven at a time when video rentals were scarce. But Harvey, who murdered his wife before taking his own life, is the dark star at the center of all the reminiscing. If you love film, tune in to "Z Channel."

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

I wish I was then and there, 2007-04-30
br /Watching this extremely interesting, informative and captivating documentary made me jealous of what films were available to LA viewers back in 70s and 80s on the Z Channel, the first American pay-cable station before HBO or Showtime: from Altman's "McCabe and Mrs. Miller" and "Images" to Fellini, to Tarkovsky's "Andrei Rublyov", to Kurosawa's films, to Antonioni's festival, to the full 15 1/2 hours Fassbinder's "Berlin Alexanderplatz", to the restored full version of Michael Cimino's "Heaven's Gate", to the director's cut of Leone's "Once Upon a Time in America", to Bertolucci's "1900", the 5 hours version. The man behind it, Jerry Harvey was a visionary and a great lover of the European and Independent movies and many famous filmmakers (Robert Altman, Jacqueline Bisset , Jim Jarmusch, Theresa Russell and many more), critics, and former co-workers as well as his first wife and his long-time girlfriend pay their tribute to him and his legacy in the documentary. They share the memories of a channel that had brought the great and unavailable anywhere else films that influenced the new generation of filmmakers, Alexander Payne and Quentin Tarantino are just two names among many. The stories of Jerry Harvey are inter-cut by the clips from the great movies that were first available to the lucky subscribers of the Z Channel. I can't resist in naming few more: "Les Enfants du paradis" (1945) aka "Children of Paradise", "Il Gattopardo" (1963) aka "The Leopard", "Fitccarraldo" (1982) , "Path of Glory", "Turkish Delight" (1973), L'Avventura, (1960), "Professione: reporter" (1975), "La Notte" (1961), "Les Quatre cents coups" (1959) aka "400 Blows" , "Tystnaden" (1963) aka "The Silence", "Le Magnifique" (1973) aka "The Magnificent". br / br /James Woods remembers how much he enjoyed working with Oliver Stone on the movie "Salvador" (1986) and he thinks of the role of Richard Boyle, the journalist whose book the films was based on as his best acting achievement. The film was a flop and was pulled from the theaters in two weeks. Jerry Harvey offered to show it on the Z Channel and it ran there for over a month. The next thing, Woods recalls - the movie received two Academy Awards nominations - for the Best Actor in a Leading Role for him and for Best Writing, Screenplay Written Directly for the Screen -for Stone and Boyle. Woods is sure that it would not have been possible without Z Channel because nobody would see "Salvador". br / br /Thanks to the documentary, I was able to recognize the movie that I saw many years ago in Moscow and still remember well, I could not only recall the title. I remember that the movie was Dutch, very erotic - in the raw, brutal, twisted yet beautiful and passionate way. Watching "Z Channel.." last night, I was happy to instantly recognize "Turks fruit" (1973) aka "Turkish Delight" made by Paul Verhoeven in 1973. There are not very many directors in the world that can create the atmosphere of raw sensuality as well as Verhoeven (of his Dutch period, especially). After I watched "Z Channel...", I found "Turkish Delight" on Netflix and saw it again. br / br /The film does not hide the dark side of Harvey who with two sisters was raised by the fundamental catholic father in a strict house. One of his sisters has committed suicide and the other vanished (more likely she took her own life, also). Harvey described his childhood as a cross between "American Graffiti" and "Two Lane Blacktop". For many years, Harvey had fought his mental conditions but in the end, he could not cope with the problems, external - pertaining to selling Z Channel to a company that tried to combine films with sports programming and mental that had always been the part of his life. In April 1988 , Harvey shot to death his second wife Deri Rudolf with the gun who was presented to him by his long time friend, Sam Pekinpah. Then, he killed himself. br / br /Controversial and disturbed, fiercely intelligent, madly in love with the films but sadly having lost the battle to the demons of depression, Harvey will be remembered for bringing to the viewers the films in their "Director's Cut" and the best foreign and independent films. br / br /In the conclusion I want to mention that the movie was made by Alexandra ("Xan") Cassavetes, the daughter of John Cassavetes, the Godfather of American Independent film-making and his muse Gena Rowlands. br / br /

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

The Z Channel was a huge influence on my life, 2006-11-20
As a child living in the San Fenando Valley, we were unable to get the Z Channel through most of its heyday. But having divorced parents my weekends were spent at my father's house in the Hollywood Hills where the Z Channel was always a fixture. br / br /Watching this documentary reminded me how much I was shaped by the Z Channel. Being exposed to such a wide variety of films (both "art" and "commercial") opened my mind in ways that transcended simply becoming a film buff. It was one of the many factors in my world that made me ask real questions about life. I'm convinced I'd have been poorer for it had I never had those weekend days and nights. br / br /I think it is a mistake to see this film as either a glorification or condemnation of Jerry Harvey personally. His story is clearly a horrible tragedy that cannot be reconciled. But his work certainly had value. I don't think one cancels out the other. We live in a morally complicated universe. I learned that watching movies every weekend at my father's house. br / br /Anyhow - I loved this film.