David Silverman
The Simpson Movie

Not a review. An act of love. by Marco Poletti

"The Simpsons" are exceptional. Or rather, excellent (Mr. Burns dixit). Indeed, why deny it, better than Kubrick and Welles, Hitchcock and Chaplin, that pompous Bergman and that cheeky Monicelli. Take "Citizen Kane," it's been quoted in nearly every episode of The Simpsons, and now you could throw the original in the trash and remake it with Simpsons quotes. And why, isn’t Kubrick's "Shining" redone in a yellow, irreverent version perhaps superior to Kubrick's original, which, frankly, makes me smile every time Jack Nicholson tries to scare us with unlikely facial expressions more resembling strokes and palsy than grimaces of terror? And Grandpa Abe redoing Chaplin’s dance with the bread rolls from "The Gold Rush," isn’t that better than the old little man in a bowler hat and cane, outdone by decades of technological innovation? But should we consider the sequence from "North by Northwest" where Cary Grant flees desperately from the attack of a rickety biplane with the same scene redone by The Simpsons, where Marge runs away and half her beehive hairdo is cut off on the run? No, much better the Simpsons than those Hollywood showboats.

"The Simpsons" are extraordinary because they quote, then quote again, and finally re-quote. Every episode of the Springfield family is a reference to something, films, books, plays. And they've quoted everything, with the great skill of always improving what they quoted: "All the President's Men," "The Fugitive," "A Clockwork Orange," "The Great Dictator," "Gremlins," "Nightmare on Elm Street," "Ben Hur," "E.T.," "Planet of the Apes," "Karate Kid," "Star Wars," and then Fellini, Frank Capra, Bridget Jones's Diary, and the classics of literature. Enough, stop reading the Odyssey at school with all those verses as old as time, those characters both surpassed and ridiculous (Homer? Tsk, a wandering layabout; Penelope? A restless goody-goody), and let’s have the parody, more beautiful and successful than any Homeric volume, with Moe, after having traveled any island and met the strangest figures existing on Earth, rightly wondering: "Is it possible that there's a nutcase on every island?" That's the honest truth. And then the parodies of Othello and Hamlet (and that other overrated playwright Shakespeare), the revised and corrected biography of that monster of boredom, Mozart, but also, more down to earth, the parodies of Batman and The Incredible Hulk.

Music too was a golden opportunity for The Simpsons to fully unleash their creativity in citations: in cartoon form, Barry White, Aerosmith, U2, Ramones, Metallica, James Taylor, Eric Clapton, Mick Jagger, Keith Richards, Paul McCartney, George Harrison, Ringo Starr, Michael Jackson, Madonna appeared alongside the yellow family. Memorably, the episode revealing the existence of the Be Sharps, a parody of the Beatles' career, with Barney, Homer's friend, in the role of John Lennon running off with a petite Japanese girl after recording the now-epochal "Goodbye My Sweet Miami Babe." And politicians, from George Bush Sr. (with whom Homer fistfights) to a naked Bill Clinton, from Ford to Kissinger. So much so that in 1992, during a session of the American Parliament, George Bush Sr. told Americans that their children should never become like Bart Simpson. The matter escalated, and The Simpsons became a political issue for nearly a year. That was their final consecration. They could dare everything, without limits and without censorship. As indeed happened.

"The Simpsons" were born from the imagination of that genius (who should be cloned) Matt Groening, someone who has revolutionized television history, and nowadays cinema, more than the transition from silent to sound did in 1927. Because they revolutionized how cartoons are conceived (hence all the various "South Park," "Family Guy," "American Dad," "Shrek" originate) and many ideas for Hollywood films, often blessed by Oscar's fortune, start here. Some examples? "Forrest Gump" owes a lot to The Simpsons: a half-wit traversing American history without even noticing it. A bit like Homer has done for 18, now 19, years. But you could quote thousands.

The media impact this cartoon had on public opinion was devastating. In an era of feel-goodism like "let's help Africa because we care so much" (remember "We Are the World"?) hearing a dialogue like: "How can we sleep at night knowing there’s hunger and famine around the world?" "By turning off the light!" sent chills down the spine even of Michael Jackson, who wasn’t a saint himself. Because there in peaceful Springfield, all the vices and virtues existing on planet Earth are enclosed. A sort of seemingly fantastical microcosm, which is actually our life, our society.

Every character has a well-defined personality, there’s a psychological study behind every character that dwarfs any previous cartoon series (think of the innocence of The Flintstones, who are the source of inspiration for the series, albeit with cynical twists of great efficiency). Starting from the Simpson family. The patriarch Homer, an irritating and distracted father, thinks more about his material pleasures than the well-being of his family, a chronic misfit, unable to catch up with the world, to the point of rejecting religion more out of spite towards God than moral convictions. He's the character the series is based on, and he’s the true deus ex machina of the entire cartoon, with traits and elements typical of the best Groening: the couch, the beer, the television (which helps raise the kids, that's his reasoning), the nuclear power plant, a real monster devouring men and their lives. There's an underlying discourse on the drugged role of work within society that had never been seen before anywhere. Work kills man, it doesn't ennoble him. Those are nonsense.

From Homer, An impressive series of characters unfold, often making history on their own. Marge, Homer’s wife, caring, kind, whose only vice is gambling, is the typical example of a "desperate housewife," long before the well-known TV series. She is the all-American mother, devoted to home and family, bowed before religious reasons, incapable of hating, except in a few rare cases where a rage consumed from within bursts forth that deforms her face. And it’s Marge who takes care of the 3 children: Bart, an anagram of brat ("rascal"), a rebel without a cause, with James Dean-like echoes that emerge especially when he wants to play the bully with bikes and cars, a young misfit as much as his father, he’s the American boy, stuffed and stunned by too much television and show-business. He idolizes clown Krusty, a Jewish man who argued with his father in his youth because he was supposed to become a rabbi instead of a clown, works with and for kids, but is cynical, mean, hates the little riffraff infesting his shows, in the name of money he’d advertise anything, from expired cereals to poisoned cough syrup. He has heart problems, got a pacemaker installed, and instead of a scar, he had a zipper implanted that stuck during a live broadcast, almost making him perish. Bart knows all this, but that's his idol, his ideal of "adult," because in America with broken families and no fathers, even the most inept and ignoble man can seem a good person.

The complete opposite of Lisa, young environmentalist, know-it-all, sax player (she even played with Bill Clinton), also a misfit like her brother, but in the opposite sense. A misfit because she is too intelligent. At school she is a victim of every abuse, but she is the delight of Principal Skinner. In keeping with the trend, Principal Skinner is a delicious parody of Hitchcock's "Psycho": a son (but not biological, a fake one) controlled with an iron fist by an elderly and despotic mother (Agnes), who will fall in love with Comic Book Guy, a hefty forty-five-year-old virgin whose only purpose in life is to spend his days on porn sites and reading science fiction comics while stuffing himself with high-glycemic junk food.

In this mad world, the supporting characters are myriad. And they are all functional to the story. From the despotic Mr. Burns, owner of the nuclear power plant, a blatant caricature of the late Howard Hughes, to the loyal butler Smithers, gay and extremely punctual in serving his master (whom he would love to see come out of a giant birthday cake naked, surrounded only by a presidential sash), to Homer's workmates, Lenny and Carl (one black, the other white, like the "Lethal Weapon" duo), to the Scottish gardener, but in Italy, for some reason, he's become Sardinian, Willie. And then Chief Wiggum, corrupt to the core but always loyal to the force, to another epitome of corruption, Mayor Quimby, illiterate, womanizer, colluded with the mafia (run by Fat Tony, a nod to Don Vito Corleone from "The Godfather"), a fervent lover of bribes which he mostly receives from Moe the bartender (alone, depressed, suicidal, looking for a woman, any woman, just so he doesn’t spend his whole life behind the bar counter serving drunks of all kinds, including Homer and Barney, his best friend, who winks at The Flintstones’ Barney Rubble), and Apu, the Indian owner of the Kwik-E-Mart, thief, and dishonest merchant, who from time to time hosts some ex-Beatles on the top of his floral convenience store roof. Not to mention Ned Flanders, the very religious and super bigoted neighbor of Homer, incapable of any brash reaction (except in a few rare cases) and a regular attendee of Springfield's Protestant Church, "managed" by Reverend Lovejoy, who knows little of the Bible and prefers to entertain himself with the construction (and operation) of whimsical model trains.

In addition, other characters, less prominently marked, but classic examples of "narrative topos," characters, that is, which serve more as a pretext to trigger multiple comedic situations rather than actual characters around which to revolve a story. Professor Frink, modeled after Jerry Lewis' character in "The Nutty Professor," the ship captain (with his iconic interjection "Argh!"), Marge's mother, and Homer's father who, during a legendary episode where "The Graduate" was parodied, almost got married (in the background, Simon & Garfunkel sang "The Sound of Granpa"), the elementary school cook Doris, the two town yokels, Cletus and Brandine. Stories with a marital background have almost always revolved around Marge's two chain-smoking sisters, Patty and Selma. The solitude that hits these two extremely ugly spinsters in question, has been a recurring theme in many episodes, climaxing (literally) in the episode where one of them marries the vile Sideshow Bob, ex-sidekick of Krusty, imprisoned thanks to investigative efforts by Lisa and, mainly, Bart. Every time he gets out of jail, he enjoys devising plans to kill Bart, but his plans always fail miserably. Sideshow Bob has been replaced by the effeminate Sideshow Mel.

After winning 81 awards, a record for being the longest-running TV series ever (Time magazine declared it the "best series of the century"), receiving a commemorative star on the Walk of Fame (thus, as they are officially actors, if asked who the greatest actor ever is, you can only answer Homer Simpson), having coined catchphrases that have become more popular over time than old and obsolete local proverbs (Homer's typical D'oh even entered the English Oxford Dictionary), and the term "homerism" is now so widespread that even kids can use it in school essays without a teacher striking it out, after a series of episodes covering everything (homosexuality, sexophobia, school, politics, society, work, health, long before that tubby Michael Moore, television, music, culture, Life, Death, new age philosophy, corruption), the series has finally become a movie. However, we old fans already knew that this would happen one fine day. Specifically, we knew it since 1993, after watching that legendary episode in which Springfield's most-watched TV show, "Itchy & Scratchy," became a film. In some way, that episode was a premonition of something, the spark that ignited the light and hope in those of us who followed it season by season, minute by minute, the entire series. And we were right. Here we are today, commenting on this marvelous movie, which cost 65 million dollars and 15 years of effort, after having written and rewritten, torn and re-torn no less than 158 scripts! That too, is another record.

"The Simpsons Movie" is The Simpsons film. It's theirs, and also ours. Ours because we have been waiting for it for so long, and we are satisfied. Satisfied because this is a wonderful film, overflowing with gags of pure brilliance, situations on the edge of the paradox, and social savagery and cynical points of view on the window of reality. The Simpsons’ satire is never sleazy or trivial like it can be with Family Guy, it’s subtle, to understand it you must concentrate without pause, without missing a single detail of what happens on the screen. And the film is a glaring example, indeed, it is the glaring example.

Everything happens when that bungler Homer decides to dump his precious pig’s waste into Springfield's lake, contaminating the entire city. The President of the United States (who? George W. Bush? Nah! Perhaps Arnold Schwarzenegger!) decides to isolate Springfield under a glass dome. I won't say more, just that the film must be seen. Because in The Simpsons the plot isn’t much, it’s the least important, what counts are the gags and visual intuitions, the way of building laughter through delightfully inspired narratives, starting low to reach, like fury, the peak, the summit, the classic empathy. Something that has never happened to anyone else.

I have deliberately overlooked the technical aspect. But it should not be relegated to secondary status. The series contains technically exceptional sequences, sometimes almost experimental, stuff that no one (not even in live-action cinema) had ever attempted. Extremely bold directorial scenes, camera movements outside the rules, depth of field that even Orson Welles would dream of (more than "The Magnificent Ambersons"!). But it’s a cartoon, and so it’s snubbed. Yet many contemporary directors have drawn inspiration from such technical genius for their films, while taking care not to mention The Simpsons as the source of their inspiration. Perhaps accepting titles like "genius," but these gentlemen have very little that is genuinely genius. Some names? Sure, why not! Steven Spielberg, Quentin Tarantino, Roman Polanski, Tim Burton. From 1989 onwards, the most ingenious technical innovations of The Simpsons have been filched by these four buster-keatons without saying anything to anyone. And not just them! The list, however, would be lengthy and exceedingly dull.

In "The Simpsons Movie," the grandest scene is the crowd with torches and pitchforks wanting to give Homer a hard time (here's a citation for you, from Frankenstein (1931) by James Whale. You see, it's easy to miss them; you need almost boundless film culture, otherwise, you lose 60% of the film). Technically, this sequence is extraordinary because it delves into the crowd using a long forward tracking shot, descending to form a kind of large, indistinct blot. It’s exceptional how the camera seamlessly moves through the bodies of the crowd, ultimately becoming a visually impactful "unicum".

Then, of course, the usual genius is present in every sequence (those who don’t see it, alas, deserve Family Guy!), and many elements, I am sure, will go down in history. Starting from "Spider Pig," which literally makes you burst into laughter, to Harry Porker. Not to mention the start, where Homer asks us why on earth we are in the cinema instead of taking a walk outside? It’s a way to create comedy, starting from that self-irony that the creators have always had towards themselves. They have always made fun of themselves, no other cartoon has ever done that, and Groening himself has put himself in the hot seat more than once. Without, however, losing sight of the great mission of satire. How? Simple, by mocking the American ecological system, the inept Presidents of the United States, and an ultimately wholesome finale. Because wholesome isn't either an insult or a flaw, it's just a way to be original. At a time when almost all films need to be violent and raw to please all the young folks around the world who love blood, horror, and other similar nonsense, here is the wholesome ending. And for heaven's sake, it takes some courage. Or not?

It’s needless to say that by now Homer and The Simpsons, in general, are an institution, that the series has been going on uninterrupted for almost 20 years, and that, hopefully, it may continue for another 40, with the hope that the creators will leave those few detractors alone who say that the latest series are worse than the first ones (well, let them enjoy their Peter Griffin or South Park, we have already forgotten about them, except for those gentlemen), we fans, and we are so many around the world (70% of those who claim to be fans of something), are fine with it as it is. Because even today, The Simpsons' irony is more alive than ever, strong and never vulgar, calm, gentle, like a smile from Homer Simpson or Marge's hoarse but sweet voice.

I conclude by thanking all those who contributed to making The Simpsons better than they already are. I speak of the voice actors. Much neglected, but never so good. From the great Tonino Accolla (voice of Homer), to the ex-Mrs. Pina Fantozzi Liù Bosisio (voice of Marge), Ilaria Stagni (Bart), Monica Ward, sister of Luca (Lisa), Teo Bellia, the voice of Moe and who twenty years ago was the Italian voice of Michael J. Fox in "Back to the Future" and all those I have not mentioned to avoid becoming more boring than I already am.

Too bad Homer is just a cartoon; now it feels as if he were one of us. Indeed, you know what? "The Simpsons Movie" is The best movie of all time. To hell with Orson Welles, "Citizen Kane" is beneath it.

This is not a review. Maybe it's a historical excursus. Or maybe it's simply a reflection of mine, not spoken but written. Surely it’s an act of love. I was born with them, cradled and grown with them. I want to die with them. So Matt, when you decide to close shop, give me a heads-up. Ok?