Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on April 19th, 2004
Synopsis
John Carradine, playing real-life author R. Chetwynd-Hayes (on whose book the movie isvery loosely based), is ambushed by vampire Vincent Price. Price drains only a bit of his blood,and upon realizing that he has met his favourite author, invites Carradine for drinks at theMonster Club. Here Price spins a trio of tales: a young woman ill-advisedly plans to steal froma lonely “shadmock” (a creature with a fatal whistle); a family-man vampire is stalked byunpleasantly bureauc...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on April 11th, 2004
Synopsis
Paul (Paul Gegauff) and Esther (Danielle Gegauff) have, on the surface, a fine marriage. Thesurface cracks open for us almost immediately, however, as we see that the reason why thismarriage is “fine” is that Esther submits completely to Paul, and becomes whatever he desires.When he suggests that they sleep with other people, she complies, and begins to forge an identityof her own, one that Paul disapproves of. He reacts first with sarcasm, then with every-increasingmental ...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on March 6th, 2004
Synopsis
M-3D purports to be a parody of MTV, which is hardly likely, given that the film, inits original form, was made in 1976. Actually Lollipop Girls in Hard Candy, this is apainful slog combining aphrodisiac lollipops with extra footage involving ancient Greek soldiersdoing sad Three Stooges routines. No, it makes no sense. No, it isn’t funny. And with obviouscuts to the sex scenes, the waste of your life is complete.
The Playmates is even more resi...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on March 1st, 2004
Liability Crisis tells the tale of Paul, a man obsessed with Hitler and the Holocaust. This obsession threatens relationships with the women in his life. Sounds like an interesting premise. But art is all in the execution.
The leads in the film are played by Jim Helsinger and Mirjana Jokovic. Helsinger has the potential to look good on screen, but the bad lighting gives off an unnatural brown pallor to his skin. His performance fluctuates between veracious and just plain awkward. Jokovic, an ac...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on February 27th, 2004
Synopsis
Jane (Renee Stahl) drifts through contemporary LA. She wants to be a writer, but is reluctantto share her uncompleted work in her writing class. She makes a living typing up term papers.She has a model boyfriend, who is off doing a shoot in Italy and misses her terribly, but she isn’tsure what she feels about him (if anything at all). Then there’s the memory of a car crash thattorments her. Enter an young artist, with whom she begins an affair...
This is very much a...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on February 24th, 2004
Synopsis
Jean-Louis Trintignant is Nicolas, a quiet, put-upon bank teller. On impulse one day, he seesa pretty young woman (Jane Birkin) and puts a very unsubtle move on her. It works. Thistransforms Trintignant’s life, especially once he confides to his crippled writer friend (Jean-Pierre Cassel). The latter begins to live vicariously through Trintignant, directing his every move.Our hero is soon sleeping with one woman after another, and through them making theconnections that see...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on February 23rd, 2004
Synopsis
Jenny (Steffanie Pitt) is tormented by dreams where she sees herself, as a young child,murdering her mother. Her psychiatrist father (Patrick Mower) is of no help, and so she sneaksout of her home one night to return to the asylum where her family once lived, and where hermother died. Three other people – a mad priest, a phony medium (Ingrid Pitt) and a drug addict– are also drawn to this location by forces they do not comprehend. It turns out that they are alltormented by...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on February 17th, 2004
Synopsis
Mickey and Negra Rosario run an inner city boxing center in New York, helping youngpeople not only to do well in the sport, but also to turn their lives around. We learn about theRosario’s lives and courtship (and about Mickey’s time in a gang), and follow a group of theirproteges as they train for an upcoming amateur tournament.
An interesting piece, with a wide variety of voices and theories about boxing. (I particularlyliked what a ref had to say about the sport ...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on February 10th, 2004
Synopsis
If George Orwell and Franz Kafka had collaborated on a murder mystery, what you’d getis The Rook. A theocratic dictatorship is coming apart at the seams as an uprising gathersevery more force. In this trouble time, a detective working for the religious authorities comesto a small town to investigate a murder. Nothing is what it seems, and he is confronted with onemysterious character after another, one mysterious event after another. Like the regime, hegradually begi...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on January 20th, 2004
Synopsis
Oh, give me a break. You want a plot synopsis for softcore 3-D porn? Fine, then. There issome incomprehensible gibberish about a crook the police are trying to nail, and the club ownercaught in the middle, who also suffers from impotence and is in love with the crook’s girl. Andthere’s a psychiatrist who keeps materializing out of thin air. There. That good enough forya? As for the sex, wake me up when it’s over.
Audio
Thin, reedy mono, but less background ...
