{"id":850,"date":"2008-05-18T02:06:32","date_gmt":"2008-05-18T06:06:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/s265039441.onlinehome.us\/philpaine\/?p=850"},"modified":"2018-08-14T10:00:53","modified_gmt":"2018-08-14T14:00:53","slug":"the-mysterious-stranger-hunt-1982","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/?p=850","title":{"rendered":"(Hunt 1982) The Mysterious Stranger; (Bridges 1984) Pudd\u2019nhead Wilson"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Lance<\/a>

Lance Ker\u00adwin and Chris Make\u00adpeace in The Mys\u00adte\u00adri\u00adous Stranger<\/em>.<\/p><\/div>\n

Back in the 1980\u2019s, Nebras\u00adka Pub\u00adlic Tele\u00advi\u00adsion under\u00adtook an ambi\u00adtious project of film\u00ading Mark Twain\u2019s less famous books and sto\u00adries. These were low-bud\u00adget affairs, but they had the mer\u00adit of remain\u00ading faith\u00adful to Twain\u2019s texts.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Pud\u00addin\u2019\u00adhead Wil\u00adson<\/em><\/span><\/span> is dif\u00adfi\u00adcult for an audi\u00adence of today to assim\u00adi\u00adlate. Few mod\u00adern view\u00aders under\u00adstand the social com\u00adplex\u00adi\u00adties of slav\u00adery in pre-Civ\u00adil War Amer\u00adi\u00adca. Twain\u2019s nov\u00adel was writ\u00adten in 1893, and set in the peri\u00adod 1630\u20131850. It turns on a \u201cswitched babies\u201d plot device, with a slave and a free baby liv\u00ading out the con\u00adse\u00adquences. The laws of slav\u00adery per\u00admit\u00adted some\u00adone who was 1\/32 black to be enslaved, so this is per\u00adfect\u00adly cred\u00adi\u00adble. Few now real\u00adize that many slaves were in this cat\u00ade\u00adgo\u00adry. Twain\u2019s bit\u00adter satire exam\u00adines, in turn, all the pre\u00adten\u00adsions, con\u00adtra\u00addic\u00adtions, and hypocrisies of a slave-hold\u00ading soci\u00adety. Only one char\u00adac\u00adter, Pud\u00addin\u2019\u00adhead Wil\u00adson, comes off favourably. He is the only one who seems to care about truth, and not to be dri\u00adven by greed, revenge, or pre\u00adten\u00adsion. Nat\u00adu\u00adral\u00adly, he is dis\u00admissed by all as a \u201cpud\u00add\u2019n\u00adhead\u201d, a fool. The low-bud\u00adget TV<\/span> film was rea\u00adson\u00adably well-craft\u00aded, and boast\u00aded a fine per\u00adfor\u00admance by Lise Hilbodt.
\n<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

But most intrigu\u00ading is The Mys\u00adte\u00adri\u00adous Stranger.<\/em><\/span><\/span> This bizarre sto\u00adry did not exist in any defin\u00adi\u00adtive edi\u00adtion until 1982. Twain worked on it for twen\u00adty years, pro\u00adduc\u00ading three extreme\u00adly dif\u00adfer\u00adent ver\u00adsions, all of which remained unpub\u00adlished. His lit\u00ader\u00adary execu\u00adtor, Albert Bigelow Paine, issued a com\u00adpos\u00adite ver\u00adsion in 1916. The film sticks clos\u00adest to this ver\u00adsion, with some ele\u00adments of the oth\u00aders. It\u2019s set in Renais\u00adsance Aus\u00adtria, where a strange youth, call\u00ading him\u00adself \u201cNo. 44, New Series 864962\u201d appears amidst the appren\u00adtices of a print\u00ading firm. His abil\u00adi\u00adty to per\u00adform sundry mir\u00ada\u00adcles, and to trav\u00adel any\u00adwhere in time and space, are revealed to one of the appren\u00adtices. The film ver\u00adsion hints at Twain\u2019s pes\u00adsimistic world-view, which some have described as \u201cexis\u00adten\u00adtial\u00adist\u201d, though this undu\u00adly triv\u00adi\u00adal\u00adizes it. Twain strug\u00adgled all his life to rec\u00adon\u00adcile con\u00adflict\u00ading atti\u00adtudes about him\u00adself and human\u00adi\u00adty, and no sto\u00adry of his shows it more than this one. This film ver\u00adsion retains enough of the meta\u00adphys\u00adi\u00adcal spook\u00adi\u00adness and reli\u00adgious skep\u00adti\u00adcism to ensure that it would come as some\u00adthing of a shock to any Amer\u00adi\u00adcan pub\u00adlic school or \u201cfam\u00adi\u00adly\u201d audi\u00adence that saw it. The pub\u00adlic is used to dena\u00adtured, can\u00addi\u00adfied film ver\u00adsions of Twain. Actu\u00adal\u00adly, it had more suc\u00adcess in Europe, where it was filmed, than in Amer\u00adi\u00adca. The young tele\u00advi\u00adsion actor, Lance Ker\u00adwin, gave a sur\u00adpris\u00ading\u00adly sub\u00adtle per\u00adfor\u00admance as No.44, though for some rea\u00adson, he was not giv\u00aden the star billing \u2014 prob\u00ada\u00adbly because the char\u00adac\u00adter played by Cana\u00addi\u00adan child star Chris Make\u00adpeace is tech\u00adni\u00adcal\u00adly the pro\u00adtag\u00ado\u00adnist. Also, Ker\u00adwin had been was main\u00adly a tele\u00advi\u00adsion actor, while Make\u00adpeace had scored suc\u00adcess in film with Meat\u00adballs<\/em> (1979) and My Body\u00adguard<\/em> (1980).
\n<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Back in the 1980\u2019s, Nebras\u00adka Pub\u00adlic Tele\u00advi\u00adsion under\u00adtook an ambi\u00adtious project of film\u00ading Mark Twain\u2019s less famous books and sto\u00adries. These were low-bud\u00adget affairs, but they had the mer\u00adit of remain\u00ading faith\u00adful to Twain\u2019s texts. Pud\u00addin\u2019\u00adhead Wil\u00adson is dif\u00adfi\u00adcult for \u2026<\/p>\n

Read more \u00bb<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"wp_typography_post_enhancements_disabled":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[946,16,948,28],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-850","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-b-reading","category-bs-reading-2008","category-d-viewing","category-ds-viewing-2008"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/850","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=850"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/850\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8548,"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/850\/revisions\/8548"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=850"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=850"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=850"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}