Golf Club Atlas
GolfClubAtlas.com => Golf Course Architecture Discussion Group => Topic started by: Jay Flemma on April 26, 2006, 10:35:13 PM
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In his book Grounds For Golf, Geoff Shackelford once compared great golf courses to epic films. For example, he called Pine Valley The Godfather and he called National Golf Links of America Citizen Kane.
The analogy has merit. To continue the exploration, it’s clear that Mike Strantz’s tour de force at Tobacco Road is clearly akin to Quentin Tarantino’s celebrated, polarizing, avante garde neo-classic Pulp Fiction. After all – Tobacco Road is celebrated, polarizing, avante garde and neo-classic.
Part Pine Valley (and therefore World Woods) for its vast sandy waste areas and part Prestwick for its numerous blind drives and approaches, the result is a dazzling and unique synergy flawlessly executed to produce a course rich in risk reward options on a breathtaking canvas. It’s easy to see how players find Tobacco Road the most atmospheric and enjoyable four miles of potential eagles or triple bogeys ever designed.
But like Pulp Fiction’s divided initial reception – where it won the Palm D’Or at the Cannes film festival but lost every U.S. Academy Award except one to the more accessible Forrest Gump starring the “safe” Tom Hanks - the road to recognition and respect for Tobacco Road has been as bumpy as the great rumpled course itself. As Strantz correctly anticipated, the course divided some in the golf community and triggered controversy and frustration along with well-deserved acclaim.
Like Pulp Fiction, many knew The Road was destined for greatness right from its opening, even in the face of vocal opposition. Just as Pulp Fiction stirred bitter controversy at the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences with its black humor, unabashed violence, deviant sexual exploration, and promotion of various aspects of criminality. so too did Tobacco Road stir controversy with its fearless courage in demanding blind and semi-blind shots to devilishly positioned greens. Nevertheless, Pulp Fiction’s riveting, poignant dialogue and virtuoso acting performances transcend its colorful subject matter. The movie made the careers of Uma Thurman and Samuel L. Jackson. So too do the strategy and artistry and other worldly, eye-popping visuals elevate The Road to legendary status in our game. With every hole playing like a crucial chapter in a book you can’t put down, The Road’s whole is greater than the sum of its mighty parts.
Both pieces were instant classics. Both are also enduring classics and are examples of the highest form of their respective crafts, raising the bar for all that followed. TR even inspired the great Black Mesa. Some feared each piece’s raw power and unabashed personality. Some panned them, but they were proven wrong, others embraced them and have been shown to be visionary.
Why? Easy. They have depth of substance and integrity. Every scene in Pulp Fiction is critical to its intricate plot, but the scenes are never rushed, for great dialogue creates endearing characters, whether they discuss mayonnaise on French Fries, sleeping like spoons, small talk on dates or matters of life and death. God was in the details. The movie’s forest is made from a grove of mighty trees: its great writing and career-defining acting performances.
Just like Pulp Fiction elevated Tarantino to the pantheon of great screenwriters and director, Tobacco Road was a defining moment, indeed career moment for Mike Strantz too. Like Tarantino, he dared to be different and challenge us. Tarantino rubs sex and violence in our face, but we tolerate it because with skillful dialogue and poignant acting he shows us how genius creates a legend – a silk purse out of a sow’s ear. So too, Strantz turns convention on its ear and says, look how much further we can reach when we suspend expectations and take some chances. Only now are we beginning to appreciate just how visionary he was, yet also how true he remained to the design strategies he imported from courses overseas.
Further, as Strantz’ idol Alistair Mackenzie believed, great courses are meant to be replayed over and over and that is when they reveal their secrets. (Just like a great movie must be seen again to reveal great dialogue.) Although both Strantz and Tarantino have reached great heights since the works discussed here, they are indelibly defined by their breakout works, their magnum opus which rightfully catapulted them to well-deserved stardom.
What other courses are like great movies? What would Sawgrass be? Would any course be Kill Bill? Black Mesa perhaps? Part samurai film, (for its seminal devotion to great design strategies and concepts) and part spaghetti western?
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Jay,
You should be a movie critic.
I would say that Shadow Creek is the "Wizard of Oz', take away the curtain and one sees an incredible architectural achievement of imported foliage and other beauty treatments but one still has a mirage. Pine Valley, it is not.
Bob
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So what you are saying is the blueprints for tobacco road were in the briefcase?
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Great zinger!
How bout Sawgrass?
Naw...the suitcase had his copy of the original signed version of the confidential guide...plenty of guys would kill for that!
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Jay, the Ebert of golf course reviews
How about Wolf Creek in Mesquite..."Roller Coaster from the Black Lagoon...Make sure your Life Insurance Premiums are Paid"
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So that would be "Final Destination 3?"
What about Sawgrass? Black Mesa?
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Black Mesa would be "Bad Day at Black Rock" starring Spencer Tracy. A true classic western. Thinking of it makes me want to book a flight to Santa Fe!
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"Golf courses like movies?"- I'd say yes, the Indies are on the cutting edge while Hollywood is still churning out remakes. ::)
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Wow, Jay, that's a fine piece of writing there. And the idea has "legs" if you know what I mean. You could go anywhere with it. You could, for example, take the "Best Picture" winners of the last 75 years, and then match them with their great "partner" golf courses, and then comment on how the changes in GCA are being paralleled by the changes in popular films. "Grand Hotel" won in 1931, I think, around the time that Jones and MacKenzie had Augusta ready. On the other hand, in 1980 "Ordinary People" beat out "Raging Bull" - which I think is a good metaphor for the start of a no-so-great period in the history of CGA. There's a book there, Jay (maybe).
But, to continue on the "Pulp Fiction" riff. IMO, "Reservoir Dogs" is the much better picture, with all the style and talent of "Pulp Fiction" but more solidly conceived and constructed. It's less flashy, and it got neither the excessive praise nor the excessive criticism that "Pulp Fiction" got, but in the end, I think it'll be considered Tarantino's most complete film (even if they keep showing "Pulp Fiction" in films schools because of its historical "significance".)
For me, I'd rather play the "Reservoir Dogs" of the golf world. Actually, most of all I like to play the "Ride the High Country" courses: a lesser known work by a fine director (Sam Peckinpah) with elements that seem to almost everyone a touch out of date (in this case, Randolph Scott and Joel McCrae, as aging cowboys).
Peter
(edit) - oh, and those would be something like "HarbourTown" and The White Course at "The Greenbrier".
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Every time I play The Mid Ocean Club in Bermuda it reminds me of James Bond and Goldfinger. Maybe it's just the aura of the whole place...very Flemming-esk (If that's a word ;)
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Lots of good Hollywood anems:
Titanic
Poisdon
Roaring Inferno
King Kong
6 easy pieces
gunfight at the ok coral
Batman begins
The postman rings twice
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I'm trying to think what courses are of the "Debbie Does Dallas" genre. None come to mind. I haven't played that many courses, though. Maybe one of the waterfall collections?
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How about:
Mission Impossible-Oakmont
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Which movie is Sawgrass? How about "Adaptation"? (Or "Go Ask Alice.")
Which golf course (or, I suppose, golf club) is "Brokeback Mountain"?
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What everyone really wants to know is this. What movies represent Harbor Town and the Ocean Course at Kiawah? Both would need to be collossal budget extravaganzas that are considered exemplary movies despite their cost. One would need to be a tight, intimate pressure cooker and the other a big, bold epic with disaster lurking at every juncture.
One possible pair would be Goodfellas and Once Upon a Time in America. If you wanted a pair of Spielberg epics you could go with Schindler's List and Saving Private Ryan. Or while I'm free associating, Cast Away and Forest Gump.
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And golf courses can be like actors....for example...Julia Roberts...easy on the eyes, but not much of a "stretch"....
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I kind of thought that Tobacco Road reminded me of A Clockwork Orange - Plenty of random violence for the unsuspecting...And then, a trip to the Milk Bar!!!
JWK
There! Now I've killed another thread!!
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This has been a very interesting thread so far...two subjects that are very near and dear to my heart!
BobH...I think your Shadow Creek analogy was quite interesting, alothugh I've never played there all I've read and heard makes me think your choice is spot on!
JayF...your initial post here was an excellent read, great work man! A quick story about my first two viewings of Pulp Fiction. I had never seen any of QT's work up to that point, and the first time I watched Pulp Fiction I was a bit taken back by it...gratuitus use of sex and violence (for no apparent purpose), a "choppy" plotline, "shock" scenes like the kids getting his head blown off and the big needle in Uma's chest...all of which added up (for me) to a movie that made little sense with very little redeeming value.
Fast forward a month or so...I had (by then) done some more research into QT's style in movie making and was beginning to understand some of his genius. My sister had come to visit and had never seen Pulp Fiction, so I anxiously sat down to watch it again, this time in a completely different frame of mind. During this second viewing I laughed at the "black humor", the violence seemed to be used to make a point, the "choppy" scenese changes and non-sequential plot movements felt fine and I thoroughly enjoyed the entire film. Talk about a night and day experience!!!!!!!
Now let's bring this back to architecture...specifically Tobacco Road. I've only had the pleasure of playing it once (back in the TraditionalGolf.Com days and one of our first ever group gatrherings), but felt at the time that this was one of those courses that you would definitely need to tour more than once to truly understand its greatness and intrigue. I hope I get that chance one of these days...
...and maybe its time for another viewing of Pulp Fiction while I'm at it! 8)
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Shivas -
Medinah is King Kong!!!
Every few years they remake it, and the new version is never as good as the original (See #13 & #17). Overall, simple plot, Big Fury Ape, Hot blonde, Ape dies in the end...
JWK
FYI, no repsonse to the Arthur Hills Cart Path Idea???
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Yale is the Shawshank Redemption with the recent work being done there...
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Just sent you an IM re the Arthur Hills Cart Path thread. If that doesn't work, the thread is on page 2 of the main board.
I hope that you catch my dripping sarcasm.
We will be at Medinah in force. We can tent hop if you would like...
I liked the U.S. Open version of #13 & #17 at Medinah much better than the 1999 PGA Versions of these two holes...
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Ishtar = Donald Trump Course in California - Way over-budget/a complete flop!
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Bandon = Lord of the Rings
In the order I played the courses last summer.....
1. Bandon Dunes = Fellowship of the Dunes
2. Bandon Trails = The Two Towers; Coore and Crenshaw
3. Pacific Dunes = The Return of the King ; Doaks Masterpiece
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Shivas: you liked the back at Pasa too, huh?:):)
Cary: "Gone with the wind:):)" That was priceless.
Debbie Does Dallas? Shadow Creek?:)
Nice job to whoever tied this in with my last thread on value at HT/Kiawah..that was really funny!
BANDON! LORD 0OF THE RINGS?!? BRILLIANT!
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Augusta National- Suddenly
Camargo- Not another Teen Movie
National- A Tree Grows in Brooklyn
Longaberger- To Catch a Thief
Inverness- Two For the Road
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Wait a minute, I got it.
Sawgrass = Frankenstein
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The Ranch at Silver Creek (San Jose, CA) = The Good, the Bad and the Ugly
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Augusta National- Suddenly
Camargo- Not another Teen Movie
National- A Tree Grows in Brooklyn
Longaberger- To Catch a Thief
Inverness- Two For the Road
Royal Melbourne-Ned Kelly (Where it all began)
NSWGC-Mad Max (During his time in Sydney, Mel Gibson often started fights he couldn't win.)
The Australian-(Breaker Morant) Another case of getting f___ed by someone from overseas.
Ellerston-Malcolm (A gem that no-one gets to see)
Royal Sydney-Muriel's Wedding (It's fun and the site of Sydney's high-profile wedding receptions.)
Portsea-The Year My Voice Broke (Another undiscovered classic set in a small Victorian town.)
St. Andrews Beach-The Coca-Cola Kid (An American Makes good in Oz)
National Moonah-Master and Commander (Another effort by a bloke with a high opinion of himself)
National Ocean-The Year of Living Dangerously (Make a mistake and you're screwed)
Barnbougle Dunes-Star Wars III-Revenge of the Sith (US/Australian joint venture finally works out.)
arb:
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Moonah Links -> Titanic (they had all the resources needed for a classic, and failed)
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J. Hoberman's meditation on Andrei Rublev
" . . . takes the form of a chronologically discontinuous pageant . . . the film projects an entire world - or rather the sense that . . . the world itself is trying to force its way through the screen. Undirectable creatures animate Tarkovsky's compositions - a cat bounds across a corpse-strewn church, wild geese flutter over a savaged city. The birch woods are alive with water snakes and crawling ants, the forest floor yields a decomposing swan."
brings to mind the South Portland Municipal Golf Course.
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Lahinch = Waking Ned Devine
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Cruden Bay = "Local Hero"?
Bad pun, anyway.
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Jay, what's the best movie ever made?
That's what I think of the back nine at Pasatiempo, the best nine holes in golf.
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On the Waterfront....Liberty National
My Fair Lady....Tie between Rawls Course and Whistling Straits
A Shot in the Dark...Bethpage Black
Frankenstein...Oakland Hills originally, PGA West the remake
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The Longest Day - Bethpage Black
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Turning Stone Casino = Evil Dead 2
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A great course for a great movie
Kapalua = Napoleon Dynamite
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Best movie ever made? Ooooooooh tough...well my FAVORITE is a tie...shakespeare in love and Pulp Fiction. Best? Casablanca maybe?
Maybe thats what Black Mesa is!!!
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interesting topic
i was once asked to compare pine valley and merion and used movie directors as a reference point:
pine valley is a Cecil de Mille movie - big production values
merion is a Billy Wilder movie (ie. sunset boulevard) more subtle - but one of the all time greats nonetheless.
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Carnoustie = The French Connection
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Could we call The International something like Apocalypse Now, because they're both REALLY REALLY long?
Are there any courses out there worthy of a Woody Allen name?
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good stuff Jay
Cypress is my favorite course I've played so far, so that's my Casablanca
would that (ridiculously?) difficult course in Hawaii be JAWS?