PZ's Picks - S&H Mar/Apr 2007

It is time to think about Jerry Lewis.

Oh, No, you say.  He is the “village idiot” of (past) American comedy.  Let that chapter stay closed.

But hear me out!

William Hale White (aka “Mark Rutherford”) was my “pick” last issue.  And Hale White was ever writing about the coldness and stoniness of evangelical religion as he had received it in the early years of the 19th century.   He was looking for its heart!  William Hale White was looking for the heart, the animating feeling, the emotion, of Christian Faith.  He barely ever found it.

If you are looking for your heart, if your heart, like the Grinch’s, is feeling simply a little too small, then you have got to get into Jerry Lewis.  That is because Jerry Lewis has heart.  His movies have heart.  True, they are swimming in long sections of un-funny and, to many today, forced slapstick.  True, about two-thirds of the duration of some of his movies seem like “dead space” to contemporary people.  But there is always heart there!  There is overwhelming heart.

There are moments, very moving and precious moments, such as when Lewis addresses the little hand puppet in The Errand Boy (1961).  Or the reduce-you-to-tears way in which he saves the embittered young female patient in The Disorderly Orderly (1964).  Or the totally touching final scene in Cinderfella (1960), in which Anna Maria Alberghetti throws away her pride by recognizing the hero’s tender qualities, and they find their love.

Such moments will awaken your heart.  Jerry Lewis has a heart.  He always had a heart.  I myself think the “French,” as they are objectified in the popular history of motion picture criticism, were right about him.  There is something warm and quite complete going on in that artist.  There are numberless gold threads there.

My personal favorite moment of Heart in the films of Jerry Lewis comes at the beginning of one of his weakest movies overall, or, rather, one of his most strained attempts.  This is The Family Jewels (1965), in which the director plays several roles, most of which are not very funny.  But at the very beginning of this actually priceless movie comes a scene of such powerful tenderness between Lewis and a little girl, of whom he is the de facto guardian, it will not fail to move you.  This scene captures perfectly the success of love between a father and a daughter, even though the characters are not related by blood.  It is perfection, and would probably not be filmed today.  For myself, I always identify with the little girl.  I hope you do, too.

So, people, especially we who say we are Christians, who are all loving in theory but, like the rest of the world, are less loving in the concrete instance, go back to Jerry Lewis.  Look again, at these flawed masterpieces.  And your heart will melt, which is meet and right so to do.

P.S.  Next issue, it’s John Ford time.  Again.