The earliest surviving film by Swedish director Victor Sjostrom is his sixth feature, also known as Give Us This Day (1913). A controversial attack on the welfare system of the period that separated mothers from their children and required forced labor from both, the film follows the widow of a grocer (Hilda Borgstrom) whose bankruptcy leads her and her children through a series of tragedies. (JR) Read more
This first feature by Catalan director Agustin Villaronga, which made the top of Village Voice critic Elliott Stein’s 1987 ten-best list, may not be for everyone, but it is certainly disturbing, powerful, and accomplished in what it sets out to do. The plot focuses on the sadomasochistic relationship between a former concentration camp doctor, who has retired to Spain in an iron lung, and the obsessive and ultimately murderous male nurse who takes care of him. A somber mixture of suspense, grim humor, and baroque perversity, it builds to a frightening conclusion. (JR) Read more
Producer David Wolper, director and cowriter Andrew Solt, and cowriter and coproducer Sam Egan assembled this 1988 profile of John Lennon from over 200 hours of footage, focusing on the superstar’s public and private lives. No totally uninteresting film could be made with this amount of material to choose from, but the absence of both intelligence and integrity in most areas makes for a perfunctory and often tacky hodgepodge. The chronology of Lennon’s career is handled so confusingly that viewers unacquainted with it are likely to be misled or confounded; Lennon’s books and his own films aren’t even mentioned, much less cited in the credits, and the frequent dubbing of records over concert footage is symptomatic of a general refusal to respect the documentary materials available. Overall this is better than nothing, but not by much. 103 min. (JR) Read more
Dr. Hess Green (Duane Jones from Night of the Living Dead) is a black anthropologist who develops a taste for blood after he’s accidentally stabbed with a dagger from an ancient civilization. Ganja (Marlene Clark) becomes infected as well, and the two become lovers and mutual tormentors in their joint journey toward death. Certainly the most original and intellectually ambitious of all the blaxploitation films of the 70s, Bill Gunn’s uneven and seldom shown but thought-provoking 1973 horror film is better known in Europe than here; the ritualistic phantasmagoria it creates — aided and abetted by James Hinton’s cinematography — lingers in the mind. 110 min. (JR)
Peter Wollen’s adaptation of his own science fiction story (included in his collection Readings and Writings) is mainly an exercise for two talking heads; this is Wollen’s first solo feature (after previous colloborations with Laura Mulvey), and is set in Jordan during the Black September of 1970. A British journalist (Bill Paterson) encounters a female extraterrestrial android named Friendship (Tilda Swinton) after she has been picked up by a PLO patrol, and the lengthy dialogues between them concentrate largely on her sympathy for and identification with the Palestinians; an epilogue focuses on a crystal she leaves behind containing thought images, which the journalist’s daughter is able to play back in London many years later. Although some of the ideas expressed in this talky film are interesting and provocative, writer-director Wollen remains a rather clunky and unimaginative filmmaker, and not even Friendship’s crystal message escapes the plodding banality of his mise en scene. The results are an intriguing appendage to a striking story (Wollen changes the sex of Friendship from male to female in the film), but are neither much of an improvement on the original nor much of a film (1987). (JR) Read more
On its face this 1984 comedy by Pedro Almodovar (Law of Desire) ought to be one of his most irreverent: Yolanda (Cristina S. Pascual), a junkie and nightclub singer, runs to a convent to escape a murder rap, where the freewheeling nuns (including Carmen Maura, Julieta Serrano, and Marisa Paredes)who favor such things as LSD and soft-core porntry to save her soul. Unfortunately, the results are rather limp as narrative, and the better moments never quite make up for the sluggish filmmaking. Worst of all, the film commits an act of inexcusable (and tacky) vandalism: appropriating one of the most beautiful film scores ever written (by Miklos Rozsa, for Resnais’ Providence) without any acknowledgment and using diverse fragments of it with no sensitivity whatsoever. This is in no way an hommage, but an act of theft. (JR) Read more
For better or worse, one of Steven Spielberg’s best films (1977), and perhaps still the best expression of his benign, dreamy-eyed vision. Humanity’s first contact with alien beings proves to be a cause for celebration and a form of showbiz razzle-dazzle that resembles a slowly descending chandelier in a movie palace. The events leading up to this epiphany are a mainly well-orchestrated buildup through which several diverse individualsRichard Dreyfuss, Francois Truffaut, Melinda Dillonare drawn to the site where this spectacle takes place. Very close in overall spirit and nostalgic winsomeness to the fiction of Ray Bradbury, with beautiful cinematography by Vilmos Zsigmond that deservedly won an Oscar. This is dopey Hollywood mysticism all right, but thanks to considerable craft and showmanship, it packs an undeniable punch. With Teri Garr, Cary Guffey, and Bob Balaban. PG, 132 min. (JR) Read more
Winner of the Camera d’Or at the 1986 Cannes film festival for best first feature, Claire Devers’ black-and-white French feature describes the extreme sadomasochistic relationship that develops between a shy, white married accountant who works at a health club and a young black masseur. The basic plot of this arty shockerwhich depends more on nuance and suggestion than on dialogue or on-screen actionis about the accountant’s discovery that he craves pain and the radical change in his life it brings about. Though this carefully crafted film has been praised for its subtlety, I found it opaque and at times downright irritating because of its puritanical peekaboo tastefulness; if the characters had been made more interesting, it might have added up to something more. (JR) Read more
Tura Satana (Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill!) stars in producer-director Ted V. Mikels’s grade-Z 1967 production about a mad scientist (John Carradine) who produces zombies (actors wearing skeleton masks) in his basement, creatures who like to rip out people’s vital organs. Scripted by Mikels and Wayne Rogers; with Rafael Campos and Wally Moon. 83 min. (JR) Read more
One hundred and two cane toads were brought into Queensland, Australia, in 1935 with the hope that they would get rid of sugar-cane grubs. The toads quickly overran the countryside, eating everything except cane grubs. In this documentary featurette, filmmaker Mark Lewis extracts as much grim humor as possible from this problem–which persists–with all its grotesque ramifications. (The strange mating habits of cane toads are described in detail; their poison has not only caused ecological disaster in the area, but also has served as an illegal hallucinogenic drug; many children treat the toads as pets; and so on.) On the same program, and much more interesting as filmmaking, are three highly original independent shorts by New Zealand filmmaker Jane Campion, all of them made while she was attending the Australian Film and Television School: Peel (1981) and A Girl’s Own Story (1984) are about family quarrels and transgressions; the remarkable Passionless Moments (1984), made with Gerard Lee, is a series of fictional miniessays that defy description. All three Campion films are strikingly photographed and edited, and comprise the most interesting Australian independent work that I’ve seen. (Film Center, Art Institute, Columbus Drive at Jackson, Saturday, August 20, 6:00 and 8:00, and Sunday, August 21, 4:00 and 6:00, 443-3737) Read more
Robert Englund is back as Freddy Kreuger in the fourth installment of the popular horror series; Finnish director Renny Harlin directed from a story by William Kotzwinkle and Brian Helgeland. Having missed the three previous installments in the cycle, I found much of the story only semicomprehensible–even after a few explanatory plot points were thrown my way about 40 minutes into the film–but it’s hard to think of many other movies where narrative is so thoroughly beside the point. This is a series of extravagant visual set pieces, one right after the other, drawing upon such sources as Keaton’s Sherlock Jr. and Through the Looking Glass, with the usual collection of Silly Putty special effects that one expects from current horror films. Harlin’s arsenal of conceits and visual effects–pirouetting overhead angles, dancing trigonometry formulas, a pizza flavored with tiny human heads, a lot of fancy play with a water bed, and much, much more–keeps it consistently watchable and inventive. With Lisa Wilcox, Andras Jones, Tuesday Knight, Ken Sagoes, Danny Hassel, and Toy Newkirk; and the combined special effects talents of Steve Johnson, John Buechler, Kevin Yagher, and Screaming Mad George. (Bolingbrook, Chestnut Station, Forest Park, Golf Mill, Orland Square, Plaza, Woodfield, Dearborn, Hyde Park, Norridge, Evanston, Evergreen, Hillside Square, Bel-Air Drive-In, Double Drive-In) Read more
Francis Coppola’s stylish and heartfelt tribute to the innovative automobile designer Preston Thomas Tucker turns out to be one of his most personal and successful movies. While the tone throughout is basically light, the overall treatment–including effective uses of 40s decor, big band music, charismatic performances, and zippy pacing–makes it euphoric. Coppola’s own personal investment in the story (his father invested in Tucker’s cars, and he clearly identifies with many aspects of Tucker’s idealism) gives it an undeniable lift, and Jeff Bridges (as Tucker) and Martin Landau (as his business partner) are especially good in sustaining the movie’s overall high. While the populist orientation of the movie, which relates to Tucker’s extended family as well as his ideals, isn’t delved into very deeply–and the darkness of the ethics of American big business is treated so perfunctorily that it counts for little more than comic shading–Coppola makes the most of his nostalgic Norman Rockwell depiction of benign American individualism. Scripted by Arnold Schulman and David Seidler; with Joan Allen, Frederic Forrest, Mako, and Dean Stockwell (in a fanciful cameo as Howard Hughes), and superb production design and cinematography by Dean Tavoularis and Vittorio Storaro respectively, as well as some inventive camera staging by Coppola. Read more
If you think you know all there is to know about F.W. Murnau (Nosferatu, Sunrise, Tabu)and it’s not likely that you would, because he never repeated himself, and major portions of the work of this consummate master of the silent era are now losttake a look at this underrated 1926 adaptation of the Moliere comedy, framed with a modern story. The mise en scene is beautifully modulated and the performancesby Emil Jannings, Lil Dagover, and Werner Krauss, among othersare first-rate. 80 min. (JR) Read more
An aging ball player (Mark Harmon) comes home to his New Jersey town after a rebellious childhood friend (Jodie Foster) commits suicide and entrusts him in her will with the disposition of her ashes; after a long period of living in obscurity, he begins to relive memories of his youth. What this uneven nostalgia piece mainly has going for it is sincerity; alternately mawkish and touching, it has plenty of feeling, but only intermittently does it come up with a very clear sense of what to do with it. Written and directed by the team of Steven Kampmann and Will Aldis; with Harold Ramis, Jonathan Silverman, Blair Brown, William McNamara, and John Shea. (JR) Read more
Robert Englund is back as Freddy Krueger in this 1988 installment of the popular horror series; erstwhile Finnish filmmaker Renny Harlin directed from a story by William Kotzwinkle and Brian Helgeland. Having missed the three previous installments in the cycle, I found much of the story only semicomprehensibleeven after a few explanatory plot points were thrown my way about 40 minutes into the filmbut it’s hard to think of many other movies where narrative is so thoroughly beside the point. This is a series of extravagant visual set pieces, one right after the other, drawing upon such sources as Keaton’s Sherlock Jr. and Through the Looking Glass, with the usual collection of Silly Putty special effects that one expects from 80s horror films. Harlin’s arsenal of conceits and visual effectspirouetting overhead angles, dancing trigonometry formulas, a pizza flavored with tiny human heads, a lot of fancy play with a water bed, and much, much morekeeps it consistently watchable and inventive. With Lisa Wilcox, Andras Jones, Tuesday Knight, Ken Sagoes, Danny Hassel, and Toy Newkirk, and the combined special effects talents of Steve Johnson, John Buechler, Kevin Yagher, and Screaming Mad George. R, 92 min. (JR) Read more