I suppose you could say that this film is somewhere in between the fun entry of last week and the more out-there films we’ve been covering recently. By this I mean that Head is a wild, crazy, semi-psychedelic journey starring fictional/non-fictional 60’s pop group The Monkees. It bounces around from scenario to song sequence to scenario to stock footage to song sequence to scenario and, well, you get the idea. All of this is done with a sense of 60’s tongue-in-cheek quality with a healthy dose of 60s experimentation for good measure. It’s very much in the vein of the unconventionally plotted (or non-plotted) films we’ve featured on this blog so far, except that this film is a much more fun ride on the surface that you can enjoy even if you don’t “get it” (or at least not fully get, anyway). Granted, by that token, I’d also argue that it’s not as rich as some of those films, but I’m rambling now. Let’s get into the story.
Well, I say “story,” but as you could probably guess with films like this, that’s a bit tricky to get into. Basically, the film starts with the four Monkees running through a bridge inauguration ceremony, and one of them ends up jumping off the side of said bridge. He lands in the water, the visuals turn “color film negative,” and mermaids try to revive him through mouth-to-mouth. This transitions into a scene of the Monkees all making out with the same woman, who ultimately declares that they’re all about “even.” The film after this point is a collection of scenes and scenarios that the band run or jump between. One takes place on a country western set during a shootout with one of them getting disillusioned at the whole thing and escaping through the stage backdrop, another involves them in a war setting where one member has to run an get a football helmet for another because the other doesn’t like the standard-issue helmets, another has them in a factory where they are lead into a big black room with no escape, yet another is (I’m assuming) a faux backstory for one of the members wherein he gives up a talent for violin playing in order to become a champion boxer, and yet another involving a member dying of thirst in the desert until he comes across a ray of hope in the form of a Coca-Cola vending machine only to find it empty. All the while, certain recurring figures keep appearing to either stop them or push them into certain situations. Yeah, it’s that kind of movie. Well, not that there was much of a plot to spoil, but I still won’t spoil where the film ultimately goes.
So, as you can probably tell by my story description, this film is pretty all over the place. However, I did manage to notice a general theme going on, which might help to explain what the film was going for. Throughout the film, The Monkees constantly find themselves being put in scenarios they don’t want to be in, interrupted by producer-esque figures, or trapped in a room with no exits. I wasn’t around in the late 60’s, so I never experienced their craze, but I do have an understanding of who The Monkees were. Basically, they were a fake pop band created for a television show that also acted as a pop band in real life (as in, they had albums and everything). However, like many groups of that era, they didn’t write their own songs and weren’t even allowed to play on their own albums. This was the heyday of session musicians, after all, with groups like the Wrecking Crew playing on hundreds of songs and albums without ever receiving credit. Anyway, I believe by around the later 60’s, The Monkees were getting fed up with not being able to express themselves creatively and essentially being little more than “corporate puppets,” forced to be whatever they were told to be. It stands to reason, then, that this film was most likely part of their attempt to break out of this “box” they were in, as well as an expression of how they must have felt. Apparently, when they did actually make some albums of their own, they didn’t go over very well (and neither did this film, from what I’ve heard). I can only imagine how crushing that must have been for them, having your true artistic voices rejected in favor of manufactured material. But honestly, that is often the nature of corporate pop music, and I don’t know if the niche crowds would have accepted them after their time as a goofy faux band either. In this way, Head can be seen as a last-ditch effort to express the wheeling events and frustrations they must have been going through back then. Monkee Micky Dolenz getting disillusioned and walking off a fake western set through the backdrop is a pretty clear indicator of their feelings towards the “TV show” nature of their existence (in that, none of it is genuine and they’re just reciting lines from a script someone else wrote). Monkee Davy Jones going through a romanticized back story of giving up violin-ing to be a boxer, only to get pummeled in the ring is most likely reflective of their defeat when it came to trying to make it on their own musical merits. A scene where Micky Dolenz is dying in the desert with the empty coke machine might be representative of the idea that corporate support often seems like the only path to take that can sustain oneself, but even then, it can still leave you out to dry (it might also be showing their attempt to “crawl back” to their producers after their failures, only to be abandoned by them completely). There’s also a point where Monkee Peter Tork gains philosophical advice from a guru that he later applies when the group are trapped in the inescapable room. It basically boils down to the “the first step to enlightenment is to admit you know nothing” sort of thing, and the other guys pretty much reject it outright (ironically, Davy Jones was both the only one to hear Peter out and the first to reject him afterwards). This sort of thing is very indicative of its time-frame. While these sorts of “existentialist” and “enlightenment” modes of thinking have never really gone away, they were highly relevant during the later 60’s. There seemed to be a want to explore these sorts of philosophies, sometimes through the use of acid, but still a want to do so, nonetheless. What I find funny is that I’m not sure if, in this film, this was meant to be a genuine expression of these concepts or if it was just a blatant dismissal of them. Either way, it helps to paint a picture of the time-frame. I’m not going to claim I got every aspect of this film, as, like with any film of this type, there’s often many different aspects that could be going into it, and you’d either need an understanding of the time period or the culture within it. I’d imagine there’s probably a sociopolitical angle in this, as that was very much a part of this era, and they blatantly show the execution of Nguyễn Văn Lém in here (the Vietnamese man who was filmed being shot point-blank with a pistol in the streets). Whether or not it truly succeeds in these endeavors, I’m not sure I can judge. However, I still found this film to be a crazy and fun ride, for the most part. As with these sorts of “wild and experimental” sorts of things, it can start to feel draining after a while. Plus, I’m not sure if The Monkees quite had enough of an art-house understanding for it to be seen as a classic in that realm (but then, art can be many things, when you get down to it). But I feel that, for what it is, Head is an enjoyable time that captures a tumultuous era in a band’s career, one in which they tried to express themselves as they were, in defiance to what they were made to be. Before I end off, I do want to praise one sequence in particular. There is a dance scene in the film that was filmed twice, once in a black room with black clothing and then in a white room with white clothing and was then edited together in a back-and-forth way at certain beats. I thought this was a very cool effect for its time, even if it didn’t always line up exactly right (though maybe that was the point?). Anyway, on to my conclusion.
Head is a wild little 60’s movie that I think can be enjoyed even if you don’t really know much about The Monkees. I’ll admit that I do have a certain affinity for these sorts of wild and weird movies, and they might not be to everyone’s tastes, but that’s kind of what this blog is all about in the end: exposing you to weird stuff you might have never known about. I’m not sure what I’m going to do for next week, but I’ll probably cover something a little denser again, so be prepared for that. Anyway, take a trip into Head with Micky, Davy, Michael, and Pete. Just don’t lose yours along the way. (Also, fun fact: apparently, Jack Nicholson helped write this movie. Just figured I’d mention that, since I found it pretty neat).