PINK FLAMINGOS - Review By Greg Klymkiw in "Electric Sheep - a deviant view of cinema"

PINK FLAMINGOS is screening as part of
It isn’t Very Pretty…
The Complete Films of John Waters (Every Goddam One of Them…)
6, 19, 25 September 2015 at BFI Southbank

Here's an excerpt from Greg Klymkiw's review of
John Waters' Pink Flamingos featured in the
latest issue of UK's coolest online movie mag

‘Just look at these,’ the Egg Man beams proudly. ‘Eggs so fresh you could hardly believe it. How about it, Edie? What will it be for the lady that the eggs like the most?’ Though Edie is placated, her ‘egg paranoia’ seems to rear its head once more, this time in the Egg Man’s presence as she begins to shudder desperately, almost orgasmically, screaming ‘Oh God, Oh God!’ However, the Egg Man will have none of it when he declares, ‘Miss Edie, as long as there are chickens laying and trucks driving and my feet walking, you can be sure that l will bring you the finest of the fine, the largest of the large and the whitest of the white. ln other words, that thin-shelled ovum of the domestic fowl will never be safe as long as there are chickens laying. I am your Egg Man and there ain’t a better one in town!’

So, does anyone reading this summary of egg obsession feel like the events are perfectly normal?

Oh, good. I’m glad you think so too.

READ THE FULL REVIEW BY CLICKING HERE

CRIES AND WHISPERS - Review By Greg Klymkiw - Cancer, Bergman Style, on Criterion BD

Cries and Whispers (1972)
Dir. Ingmar Bergman
Starring: Harriet Andersson, Kari Sylwan,
Ingrid Thulin, Liv Ullmann, Erland Josephson

Review By Greg Klymkiw

Ingmar Bergman's Cries and Whispers is enclosed in a thick, deep red membrane; every frame splashed with a kind of sickeningly putrid menstrual blood which has been expunged from some horrific, barren place of hatred and regret, enveloping the pain of its three sisters Agnes (Harriet Andersson), Karin (Ingrid Thulin) and Maria (Liv Ullmann), never allowing the force of healing and relief to take over completely and allow the characters a greater sense of love and fulfillment.

The film's greatness cannot be denied. It has haunted me for 40+ years and at several points throughout my life, it's been there for me: casting shadows of darkness, revealing depths of despair, exuding feelings of longing and generously displaying its stunning cinematic virtuosity. Much like an old friend who remains just around the corner, or rather, not unlike a monkey upon our collective backs, the film exists to remind us how important it is to grasp whatever sliver-like shards of joy life affords us, lest we become wholly consumed by the sheer misery of it all.

At the film's centre is Anna (Kari Sylwan). She is the heart pumping with lifeblood as opposed to the putrescence of anguish, the expulsion of toxic poison, lying in wait to envelope life and upon discovering there's nothing there, it gushes and sticks to those bereft of kindness and caring.

Agnes has cancer. She's dying. Karin and Maria have come to the family's country estate to preside over the death-watch. Anna is the plump domestic who runs the household and takes care of Agnes. Bergman takes us through the stages of the final agony by deftly providing us with a series of flashbacks which inform the current situation. Childhood for the sisters was sheer joy. They were very close. Their mother (also played by Liv Ullman) is loving, but often seems distracted, if not distant. At one point we see her infused with such utter, quiet sorrow that it seems to inform everything in the film. We learn that Agnes was always the odd, ugly duckling and that she remained unmarried and alone, save for the loyal Anna (whose own child died tragically many years earlier, but to whose picture she examines everyday and prays to with deep devotion).

Karin married a petty diplomat. In spite of wealth and travel, she hates him - so much so, that one night, smelling (no doubt) of the greasy, rancid-looking fish he wolfed down over supper, her husband awaits Karin's conjugal visit, and she privately masturbates with a shard of crystal from a broken wine glass, only to present him with the sight of the blood gushing from between her legs and smearing it all over her almost cruelly lascivious face.

Maria, the most frivolous of the three sisters also married into wealth - a husband with such a weak, spineless demeanour that he seems born to be a cuckold and to be cuckolded. She does what she must and cuckolds him, but unlike his dalliances away from the conjugal bed, she chooses to soil it within their home. Even more sickening is that her primary love interest is the creepy local doctor (Erland Josephson) who coldly presides over Agnes's final days.

Bergman paints a portrait of a family united by blood, but not much else. Whatever love they had for each other in childhood has turned to stone. At one point, Karin lets it all spill out to Maria, who responds blankly to these words tinged with bile:

"Do you realize I hate you and how foolish I find your insipid smile and your idiotic flirtatiousness? How have I managed to tolerate you so long and not say anything? I know of what you're made - with your empty caresses and your false laughter. Can you conceive how anyone can live with so much hate as has been my burden? There's no relief, no charity, no help! There is nothing. Do you understand? Nothing can escape me for I see all!"

Poor Agnes desperately wants her sisters to be with her and touch her in these final hours, but more often than not, they sit immobile in the gorgeous parlour outside her room. What Karin confesses to a Maria who does not bother to challenge the horrendous assertions is enough to prove that the desperate desires of Agnes will not be fulfilled. She'll go to her grave never feeling the love of her siblings.

Finally, it's left to Anna to hold Agnes close to her warm, inviting, motherly bosom. During one unbelievably creepy and nightmarish sequence, after Agnes's final internal combustion of pain followed by her last gurgling croaks of life, she is dead, yet her consciousness remains in her sick room. She asks for her sisters to visit one by one to assist in her spiritual passage to the other side. Here they fail miserably and again, it is up to the servant Anna to offer this solace.

Even Bergman at his most brilliant and despairing, never made a movie like this. Its setting is the most exquisitely furnished and adorned home, yet everything feels untouched, unloved. It's stifling and claustrophobic. The physical beauty of the surroundings are as empty as the hearts of Karin and Maria - both of whom express hatred for each other. Even when they briefly reconcile, it is short-lived.

The pain, the savagery of the cancer ripping the insides of Agnes apart is unrelenting. Bergman lavishes his camera over every detail, the slow movements of Agnes, the rigour she must employ to do the simplest of things like reaching for a glass of water, walking to a window to look at the rays of sun, sitting at a desk to write her memoirs, every stroke of the pen sending jolts of pain into her body and then, in words on the page, describing the pain as well.

Sven Nykvist's cinematography and longtime collaboration with Bergman reaches a pinnacle that could never be matched. We never see outside the windows, only the natural light pouring through them upon the beautiful, but cold and stately physical interior consume our perspective. Worst of all, when the lens attempts to caress the faces of its characters, especially Karin and Maria, all we get is the pain, hatred and regret, ozing from their pores of skin, which we can see in vivid detail.

Some movies are just inextricably linked to your being. Cries and Whispers is such a picture for me. I first saw it at a very young age with my mother. Her sister and my beloved aunt, had experienced a similar death from cancer. The pain we both felt was acute and yet, I remember my mother being affected, not just viscerally, but by Bergman's artistry and the sheer genius of the acting. I lived with the film through repeated viewings over the course of 40+ years. My most recent viewings came during my mother's year-long struggle with stomach cancer and in the weeks after her pain-wracked final weeks and, ultimately, death, I had to see the film even more.

It touches and reminds you of life's fragility and ultimately, the importance of love and forgiveness. In the movie's final moments, we hear a diary entry from Agnes as Bergman takes us out of the dank, sarcophagus-like atmosphere of the blood-red interiors and upon the sumptuous, rolling green lawns of the estate. All three sisters, dressed in white and carrying frilly parasols, gently walk the grounds with the loyal Anna accompanying them. They rush to an old swing, so special in their childhood. They take seats as Anna swings them back and forth. The final words of the film (in a heartfelt homage to Eugene O'Neill's immortal play of familial suffering, acrimony and grief, Long Day's Journey Into Night) have Agnes revealing the following:

"All my aches and pains were gone. The people I am most fond of in all the world were with me. I could hear their chatting around me. I could feel the presence of their bodies, the warmth of their hands. I wanted to hold the moment fast and thought, "Come what may, this is happiness. I cannot wish for anything better. Now, for a few minutes, I can experience perfection. And I feel profoundly grateful to my life, which gives me so much."

We sit, in stunned silence, tears pouring from our eyes, our thoughts turning to all those we've loved and continue to love and we are, ourselves, profoundly grateful for everything in life, which has indeed given us so much - and especially, Ingmar Bergman's hallowed gift us, Cries and Whispers.

THE FILM CORNER RATING: ***** 5 Stars

Cries and Whispers is available on Blu-Ray from the Criterion Collection. It features a wealth of glories for us to be grateful for, including a 2K digital restoration, an introduction by Bergman, shot in 2001, an all-new interview with Harriet Andersson, conducted by Peter Cowie, a video essay by filmmaker :: kogonada, behind-the-scenes footage with Cowie's commentary, a one-hour-long documentary from 2000 entitled Ingmar Bergman: Reflections on Life, Death, and Love with Erland Josephson (2000), exquisite new translation of the dialogue in English for the subtitles, an optional English-dubbed soundtrack (which helps those who don't speak Swedish to watch repeatedly and concentrate on the visual, an essay by film scholar Emma Wilson in the accompanying booklet and a stunning new cover design by by Sarah Habibi ace Criterion artist Sarah Habibi.

THE INNER EYE, SIKKIM, BALA, TWO: FOUR SHORTS BY SATYAJIT RAY - Review By Greg Klymkiw #TiffBellLightbox

Don't miss a single one of these great films on display at TIFF Bell Lightbox in the TIFF Cinematheque series "The Sun and the Moon: The Films of Satyajit Ray". From visionary programmer James Quandt, this is one of the most important retrospectives ever presented in Canada. If you care about cinema, you can't afford to miss even one. Heed the warning below!!! The Film Corner & Mr. Neeson mean business!!!

Few directors looked as cool as Satyajit Ray
when he had a cigarette dangling from his lips.

Sikkim (1972) Dir. Satyajit Ray 52mins. *****
Review By Greg Klymkiw

This exquisite portrait of life in the Himalayan kingdom of Sikkim was banned for many years in India and only recently has been revived and lovingly restored in 35mm. If all geographic documentaries were as intelligent, tasteful and compelling as this I'd be glued to whatever specialty channel was broadcasting them for hours, days, weeks, months, if not years on end. Thank God, for my life and general well being, that only Sikkim exists and towers well above the best of this genre of film. It has a simple, but effective structure - we're introduced to the kingdom, delivered a punchy informative history, follow the activities of its inhabitants, get to meet the royal family and finally follow a massive cultural festival in its glory. Ray, in his great dramas surely rivalled Ingmar Bergman in terms of capturing the indelible landscapes of the human face. Here, in this documentary, he continues the tradition. The film's gorgeously shot, beautifully written and expertly narrated by Ray himself. This is not only filmmaking at its finest, but an important slice of a time and place that now remains etched upon celluloid forever.

The Inner Eye (1972)
Dir. Satyajit Ray 20mins. ****

Review By Greg Klymkiw

This is probably one of the best, if not the best documentary portrait of a visual artist I've ever seen.

Ray focuses on the great Indian visual artist Binod Behari Mukherjee (with whom Ray studied). Ray again writes gorgeous narration, delivers it beautifully and captures the essence of this astounding treasure of Indian art by ultimately letting the man and the work speak for itself.

Ray delivers a deft series of biographical details, captures the artist's philosophies on art and life and maybe inadvertently opens a window upon Ray's great visual work as a filmmaker by the manner in which he presents Mukherjee's art.

Of course, the most extraordinary aspect of this tale is that the Master himself eventually went blind, but tapped into his "inner eye" to keep creating stunning work in spite of his handicap.

A truly beautiful and inspirational experience and Ray captures it in only 20 minutes. It's 20 minutes wherein life seems to stand still and we get a glimpse into one of fine art's great geniuses.

Bala (1976) Dir. Satyajit Ray 29mins. ***1/2
Review By Greg Klymkiw

Balasaraswati (known by her more popular diminutive stage name Bala) was already in her 60s when this documentary portrait of her was made. This prima ballerina who specialized in the art of the Bharatanatyam dance had continued to practice her art. Using a wealth of archival materials, Ray delivers the fascinating biographical details of her life, renders aspects of her contemporary life and frames everything within the context of two full dances. Ray captures her dancing simply and beautifully - once in the studio, and again out against a stunning natural backdrop. He keeps a mostly fixed position and only moves his camera with her movement. The dances themselves are so spectacular that one interview subject talks about how Bala's dance had the legendary Martha Graham shuddering and weeping with astonishment. Ray's indelible portrait is such that we do not doubt this for a second.

Two (1964) Dir. Satyajit Ray 15mins. ****
Review By Greg Klymkiw

This simple, beautifully shot (in gorgeous black and white) fable of haves and have-nots is as delightfully entertaining as it is deeply and profoundly moving. Ray tells his tale with no dialogue whatsoever. A little rich boy on the second floor of his family's home plays alone with his huge collection of expensive toys. At one point, he looks outside the window and sees a poverty-stricken youth also playing by himself. The two lads make a connection, but soon the rich boy is demonstrating all his wonderful toys in a gloatingly uncharitable manner. The film turns into a rivalry between two children on the extreme opposites of social strata. Where it ends up, finally, is a heartbreaker. Such is the art of Maestro Satyajit Ray.

The Inner Eye: Four Shorts (THE INNER EYE, SIKKIM, BALA, TWO) By Satyajit Ray is presented at TIFF Bell Lightbox on Tuesday, July 15, 2014 at 8:45 p.m. as part of the TIFF Cinematheque series "The Sun and the Moon: The Films of Satyajit Ray". NOTE: Sikkim IS A RESTORED 35MM FILM PRINT & Two IS A RESTORED 16MM FILM PRINT. This might be your only chance to see this masterpiece the way it was meant to be seen, so get your tickets NOW and GO. Visit the TIFF website for further details by clicking HERE.

DON'T FORGET TO BUY YOUR SATYAJIT RAY MOVIES FROM THE LINKS TO AMAZON.CA, AMAZON.COM and AMAZON.UK, BELOW. DOING SO WILL ASSIST WITH THE ONGOING MAINTENANCE OF THE FILM CORNER.

*BUYERS PLEASE NOTE* Amazon.ca (Canadian Amazon) has a relatively cruddy collection of Satyajit Ray product and generally shitty prices. Amazon.com has a huge selection of materials (including music and books) and decent prices. Amazon.UK has a GREAT selection of Satyajit Ray movies from a very cool company called Artificial Eye (second these days only to the Criterion Collection). Any decent Chinatown sells region-free Blu-Ray and DVD players for peanuts. Just get one (or several - they can be that cheap) and don't be afraid of ordering from foreign regions. The fucking film companies should just merge the formats into one acceptable delivery method worldwide. Besides, you can order anything you want from any country anyway.

AMAZON.CA:

AMAZON.COM:



AMAZON.UK:

THE POSSESSION OF JOEL DELANY - Review By Greg Klymkiw - Flawed 70s shocker offers far more effective chills and thrills than the new Hispanic-tinged "Paranormal Activity: The Marked Ones" - thanks to Santeria!

After I slice and dice these kids,
I'll go on to star in MANDINGO.

The Possession of Joel Delaney (1972) **1/2
dir. Waris Hussein
Starring: Shirley MacLaine, Perry King, Edmundo Rivera Alvarez
Review By Greg Klymkiw

Santeria is some scary shit and has largely been ignored by horror films. This might have something to do with the fact that it’s a religion and therefore politically incorrect to drag it into the realm of such a “lowly” genre. That said, political correctness has never reared its ugly head when Catholicism or other religions are delightfully exploited for similar purposes, so one can only gather that either Liberal-minded creators are happy to exploit the dominant European religions, but unable to bring themselves to do so for the saintly Third World blend of Jesus-worship and voodoo or it might be that they just haven’t had their thinking caps skewed in the direction of Santeria. That said, this 70s thriller goes whole hog on the Santeria front and includes one freaky exorcism sequence that blends very cool Latin musical stylings with all the shrieking, convulsing and chanting you can handle.

The Possession of Joel Delaney is seriously flawed, but still manages to effectively raise the hackles on a number of fronts – not the least of which is its creepy, deliberate pace as we’re treated to the tale of a wealthy, fur-laden New York housewife (Shirley MacLaine) who slowly comes to realize that her messed-up lay-about brother (our title character – marvelously played by Perry King in his first feature film role) is possessed by the spirit of a now-dead serial killer who delights in severing the heads of his female (‘natch) victims with one Mother of a switchblade.

It’s a movie rife with all sorts of interesting shadings – undertones of incest, the wide gap between rich and poor, the dichotomous cultures of WASPS and Puerto Ricans and, most fascinating of all, the backdrop of Santeria. Unfortunately, the movie is marred by some really clunky direction and a clutch of dreadful performances.

Director Waris Hussein seemed an unlikely choice for this film adaptation of Ramona Stewart’s very cool novel which kept this feller up for several late nights as a kid – clutching a flashlight under the blankets to keep reading, but to also ward off fear of the dark. Hussein’s previous directorial attempts included the extremely entertaining counter-culture kiddie sleeper hit Melody (replete with a classic BeeGees score and that double-infusion of Oliver star wattage Mark Lester and Jack Wild) and the whimsical, delightful Gene Wilder comedy Quackser Fortune Has A Cousin In The Bronx. He clearly seems out of his element with this material and it’s certainly one of the oddest studio pictures I’ve seen from this period since it equally balances some really effective sequences with moments that raise Ed Wood to the heights of Bergman.

He ain't Warren Beatty
He's My Brother

Even Shirley MacLaine (the reincarnation-believing estranged sister of Warren Beatty) seems weirdly unsuited to the requirements of the picture. She handles the rich-bitchiness of the role with considerable assuredness, but many of her other emotions feel forced and even annoyingly shrill. The latter performance flaw is especially odd when she’s called upon to be vaguely caring and/or maternal. It’s so insanely uneven that one can only think she felt she was slumming and wrong-headedly thought she needed to mix things up to keep it interesting for her. MacLaine isn’t, however, the only one rendering a bad performance. Many of the American and British actors in the film feel like foreigners dubbed into English, though are clearly WASP-ish thesps recorded mostly with synch sound. Only Perry King is dubbed with regularity, but at least that makes sense for the character since his voice is only replaced when he's speaking Spanish in the serial killer’s demon spirit. In fact, King delivers solid work and it’s clear why he went on to become a popular leading man in the 70s.

Aside from King, the only performances of note come from the Puerto Rican actors Hussein cast in supporting roles. One of the most memorable and stirring appearances in the picture comes from Edmundo Rivera Álvarez as the Santerian exorcist Don Pedro. He’s only on-screen in two scenes, but he is so riveting – blending compassion with religious fervor – that one almost wished he had more scenes. In fact, it might have been far more interesting to expand his role to the size of that of Max Von Sydow’s in The Exorcist (that little 70s possession picture that has definitely outshone this one). Interestingly, Álvarez was a prominent actor, director and playwright in Puerto Rico who, in spite of his prolific work in his home country never found a place in mainstream Hollywood cinema and died in relative poverty and obscurity.

For all its problems, though, The Possession of Joel Delaney is still a picture worth seeing – especially for fans of the horror genre. It has enough creepy moments to keep one glued to the screen. It’s also yet another bold DVD release from Legend Films – taking an obscure picture from the Paramount catalogue and getting it out in the world for all to see. And for a glimpse at a small, but dynamic performance by Edmundo Rivera Álvarez and the Santeria action, it’s worth catching up with.

10 Terrific Space Movies to see instead of GRAVITY or 10 Reasons NOT to see GRAVITY - By Greg Klymkiw

There's really no need to see this movie!

October 4, 2013 saw the release of Gravity, a dull, predictable, badly written and clearly expensive space thriller which opened wide on several thousand screens in uselessly annoying 3-D. It has already amassed a ludicrously high "Fresh" rating on Rotten Tomatoes and this highly touted trifle will be a huge hit. To the former, most critics aren't real critics and the real critics who've ejaculated on the film are probably so depressed over all the crap they have to see that Gravity did indeed feel special to them. The reality is this - it's really not very good. There exist, however, a clutch space travel movies that offer far more than what's on display in Alfonso Cuarón's trifle of a picture. Buy, rent, VOD or if, God willing, they're in rep somewhere, see them as they're meant to be seen. Any of these suckers deliver the real thing rather than wimpy, weepy eye candy. The most recent and obvious choice for this list is Europa Report, the phenomenal picture from this very same year that's received virtually no release of any consequence.

SEE IT! NOW!

Europa Report (2013) ****
Dir. Sebastián Cordero
Starring: Anamaria Marinca, Daniel Wu, Karolina Wydra, Michael Nyqvist, Sharlto Copley, Christian Camargo, Embeth Davidtz, Dan Fogler, Isiah Whitlock Jr.

Easily one of the best science fiction films I've seen in years. It had me charged with excitement from beginning to end. A private corporation launches a historic manned flight to Jupiter's Moon of Europa, a huge orb covered completely with ice and most probably having one of the likelier possibilities of life in our solar system due the presence of water. An international crew of six astronauts are onboard for the mission and director Sebastián Cordero astonishingly covers every key detail of the trip via an insane number of POVs from the cameras set up by the corporation. Europa is, of course, fraught with danger and the filmmakers work overtime to keep us on the edge of our seats. What drives the film is the potential to discover life - it might be simple or complex, benevolent or dangerous, but there will be life. And it will be awe-inspiring.

Here are more top picks for space travel movies (in alphabetical order):

SEE IT! NOW!

2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) *****
Dir. Stanley Kubrick
Starring Keir Dullea, Gary Lockwood, Douglas Rain

This is truly the greatest of them all. A collaboration between Arthur C. Clarke and Stanley Kubrick, this monumental picture is still ahead of its time and delivers what feels like the closest approximation of what it must be like to travel in space. Spanning the Dawn of Man through to a deep space journey to Jupiter, Kubrick takes all the time he needs to lavish attention over the simplest, though most gorgeous elements of space travel. In addition to the dazzling opening involving prehistoric man, we occasionally meet up with mysterious ancient alien monoliths which inspire continued leaps in mankind's evolution (or devolution) and its ability to traverse the universe in traditional spacecraft and by more spiritual means. 2001 is partially a muted thriller involving the famous robot HAL who attempts to murder the entire crew to carry on a mysterious mission into the netherworld of deep space. On the other side of the coin, it's a glorious head film that inspires audiences to accept the purely experiential aspects of Kubrick's visual genius - whether one chooses to see it stoned or straight. It also proves that 3D is completely unnecessary. In fact, it proves that 2-D is, in the hands of a real artist - multi-dimensional. I'm happy to say that my first few helpings of the film were as a kid in an old National General Cinerama theatre with the huge, deep, curved screen. Take that, IMAX!!!!!

SEE IT! NOW!

Armageddon (1998) ****
Dir. Michael Bay
Starring: Bruce Willis, Ben Affleck, Billy Bob Thornton, Liv Tyler, Owen Wilson, Will Patton, Peter Stormare, William Fichtner, Michael Clarke Duncan, Steve Buscemi

Pure roller coaster ride, but what a ride! A huge all-star cast propels this taut disaster epic wherein a team of pure testosterone blasts into outer space to drill into the core of a mighty asteroid hurtling towards Earth and to nuke the bugger to kingdom come before life as we know it ceases to exist. Visceral thrills of the highest order and loaded with plenty of true grit and heart. Critics crap on this, but audiences knew and still know the score. The movie rocks big-time!

SEE IT! NOW!

Journey to the Far Side of the Sun AKA Doppelgänger (1969) ***1/2
Dir. Robert Parrish
Starring: Roy Thinnes, Ian Hendry, Lynn Loring, Patrick Wymark

Moody and creepy space thriller from Britain's Gerry Anderson and Co. doing their first live-action feature after a successful canon of animated sci-fi TV shows like Thunderbirds which used marionettes in place of actors. No puppets here, though. Two terrific, underrated character actors play a pair astronauts who discover a planet in an identical orbital position to that of Earth located directly on the opposite side of the Sun. Well written and very strange. It certainly pre-dates the notion of parallel universe and is as fascinating now as it was in the 60s.

SEE IT! NOW!

Marooned (1969) ***1/2
dir. John Sturges
Starring: Gregory Peck, David Janssen, Richard Crenna, James Franciscus, Gene Hackman

Cool optical effects (as opposed to antiseptic digital F/X) rule the day in this genuinely suspenseful sci-fi melodrama involving a ship with major mechanical failures that's trapped in outer space. Three astronauts are sardine-tinned in the ship while mission control does what it can to bring the boys home and the wives weep and fret down below (as good wives should do). Though the movie inexplicably errs on a number of key technical elements of space travel, it gets far more of them absolutely dead-on. The film's release pre-dated the somewhat similar disaster that befell Apollo 13 and was spectacularly presented in 70mm, 6-track sound (which, Thank Christ, I had the joy of seeing a few times as a kid). The movie even inspired the Apollo-Soyuz Test Project in 1975 which was a result of the Apollo 13 disaster. Kick-ass manly-man director John Sturges (The Great Escape, The Magnificent Seven, Bad Day at Black Rock) handled the claustrophobic action brilliantly and a good deal of the picture is genuinely nail-biting. The performances are first-rate, but it's Gene Hackman who steals the show as a space flyer who starts to crack-up big-time. There's also absolutely no musical score. The interior soundscapes within the ship, and back on Earth works just fine, but one does have to ignore the exterior sound in zero gravity since it doesn't exist out there.

SEE IT! NOW!

Moon (2009) ****
dir. Duncan Bell
Starring: Sam Rockwell, Kevin Spacey

Space is thrilling, exciting and full of adventure, but when you get right down to it, the whole experience has got to be extremely creepy and Duncan Bell exploits this notion to terrifying effect as Sam Rockwell plays the sole human being presiding over a mining project on the dark side of Earth's Moon. His only companion is the Über-Creepy GERTY the robot (Kevin Spacey's voice, 'natch!). Shit is slowly hitting the fan and the entire movie plunges into nightmare territory.

SEE IT! NOW!

The Right Stuff (1983) *****
dir. Philip Kaufman
Starring: Fred Ward, Dennis Quaid, Ed Harris, Scott Glenn, Sam Shepard, Barbara Hershey, Lance Henriksen, Veronica Cartwright, Jeff Goldblum, Kim Stanley, Levon Helm

One of America's greatest living directors crafted one of America's greatest motion pictures about outer space. Based upon Tom Wolfe's book, Kaufman plunged us into a gorgeous, thrilling, supremely entertaining and utterly fascinating look at the history of modern space flight - telling the story of test pilot Chuck Yeager and the seven brave men who were part of America's Mercury space program. Every aspect of this film is pure perfection and it's not only infused with epic sweep, but it's deliriously romantic. One of a handful of genuinely great motion pictures from the otherwise horrendous decade of the 80s.

SEE IT! NOW!

Silent Running (1975) ***1/2
dir. Douglas Trumbull
Starring: Bruce Dern

A huge convoy of spaceships loaded with plant life floats amongst the stars to regenerate what's been lost to pollution on Earth. When Mission Control decides to abort the mission due to funding and general lack of interest in environmental concerns, Botanist Bruce Dern goes insane ('Natch!), murders the whole crew and jettisons in the netherworld to preserve the plant life. The whole movie is pretty much Bruce Dern, two drones he names Huey and Dewey, Joan Baez singing about flowers, trees, birds and bees (gotta love the 70s) and endless shots of whole forests under huge domes in outer space. You kind of need to ignore the fact that the Earth apparently has NO plant life at all, yet appears to be perfectly functioning. Just imagine that the interplanetary greenhouses are to build up plant life on the verge of extinction - or something - because it's a pretty damn fine movie in all other respects from F/X whiz Trumbull (2001).

SEE IT! NOW!

Solaris (1972) *****
dir. Andrei Tarkovsky
Starring: Natalya Bondarchuk, Donatas Banionis, Anatoli Solonitsyn, Sos Sargsyan, Vladislav Dvorzhetsky

From one of the great masters of Russian Cinema, you'll not see a space travel movie quite like it - steeped in sorrow, melancholy and a brand of cinematic humanity that could only have been achieved by Andrei Tarkovsky. A psychologist travels into deep space to investigate the mental health of a crew on an interstellar station perched above the planet Solaris - comprised of no known land mass and seemingly an orb of pure ocean. The crew has stopped communicating with each other. When our head doctor arrives, the space station is a complete disaster area, the crew of two ignores him, a third crew member has committed suicide prior to his visit, the space station appears to be full of crew members who shouldn't be there (and who don't communicate with anyone) and in the middle of the night, the doc wakes up in his room (which he's barricaded) to find himself in the company of his late wife. Things begin to get strange. Prepare to be alternately creeped out and moved to tears. One of the greatest movies of all time.

SEE IT! NOW!

A Trip To The Moon (1902) *****
dir. Georges Méliès

Scientists blast off to the Moon, its bright side adorned with the face of a man. The rocket lands in the eye of the Moon's face. The scientists are assailed by grotesque moon creatures. They're pretty easy to kill, but eventually they acquire strength in overwhelming numbers and a desperate fight ensues to safely board the ship and return to Earth. 18 minutes of pure movie magic from the great early magician of cinema, Georges Méliès - this film and its creator immortalized in Martin Scorsese's Hugo. Though shot and released primarily in black and white, Méliès generated and presented a limited number of painstakingly hand-coloured prints. They were all said to be lost. One was found and restored - frame by frame. One frame of this film has more magic, imagination and innovation than the entire running time of Gravity and, for that matter, most contemporary movies.

Here is the color restoration of A TRIP TO THE MOON - Please BUY the BLU-RAY - it Kicks Mega-Ass:

FUZZ - Review By Greg Klymkiw - 70s Cop comedy with Burt Reynolds and Raquel Welch is replete with all manner of politically incorrect material for thine edification and acceptance.

Fuzz (1972) **1/2
dir. Richard A. Colla
Starring: Burt Reynolds, Raquel Welch, Jack Weston, Tom Skerritt, Steve Ihnat, Yul Brynner, Bert Remsen, Charles Martin Smith, Charles Tyner, Don Gordon, Peter Bonerz, Tamara Dobson, Gino Conforti, Gerald Hiken and Uschi Digart

Review By Greg Klymkiw

Fuzz is a 70s cop-movie with a light touch that I vaguely recall enjoying when I first saw it in 1972. And now, almost forty (!) years later, I was compelled to take another gander. On one hand, I could see why it was so forgettable, but on the other (and because of its forgettable "qualities") I'm pleased to report that it's an extremely pleasant movie, especially as a relatively familiar entity that I was now viewing with fresh eyes - as if I'd never even seen it before.

There's nothing at all earth-shattering or exceptional about the picture, but it's a blast watching a stalwart 70s cast do their thing against the backdrop of a few days in the life of a ragtag police precinct. Burt Reynolds, Tom Skerritt and Jack Weston are the three cops the picture primarily focuses on. They're all working on a variety of cases- the main ones being a local rapist terrorizing the neighbourhood and trying to nab a pair of teenagers (one of whom is played by American Graffiti's "Terry the Toad", Charles Martin Smith) who are dousing alcoholic bums with gasoline and setting them on fire.

The rape case is an especially hard nut for the cops to crack and the brass decides to bring in a policewoman to do the job. That she is Raquel Welch in her absolute prime is especially good news for the all-male environment of the precinct. I've never seen more gratuitous shots of male characters ogling a female character in my life in one movie. And, what the hell - she does look stunning in the picture. Who wouldn't be ogling her - male or female.

Before the key crime wends its way into the film's plot, the most pressing and persistent issue in the precinct seems to be that two inept painters have taken over the detective room and in addition to impeding the cops' work, they are continually annoying everyone with their corny one-liners and routines which suggest they'd have had a great career as Borscht Belt comics. Gino Conforti and Gerald Hiken are so hilarious they come close to stealing the whole movie.

To make matters worse for this group of detectives is that their precinct has been targeted by a potential crank with a series of extortion demands via telephone - threatening the lives of several city officials. The extortionist, with a voice sounding suspiciously like Yul Brynner's, takes care to note that he chose this precinct because it was the most incompetent.

Well, to the men and WOMAN of the 87th Precinct, them's fighting words - so much so, that they can't shove their heads in the sand and pawn it off on another division (which they'd prefer), but have to be forced by the brass to handle the case in addition to all the small potatoes stuff they're bollixing up.

Yup, it's an adaptation of one of Ed McBain's 87th precinct cop novels that he wrote under the nom-de-plume of Evan Hunter and it's a decent enough film adaptation of that world. As I watched the movie recently, all the McBain books I read as a kid came back to me - not so much the details, but the style and world was quite unique in crime fiction. In the film as in the books, there's a fair bit of time spent on the details of police procedure that many might consider dull, but are, in fact, pretty entertaining - especially when played (mostly) straight for the natural humour inherent in such plodding details.

Brynner, by the way, and not surprisingly, is a great villain and he seems to be having a lot of fun. He spits out his invectives with considerable relish. In one scene, his moll (played by the stunning Tamara "Cleopatra Jones" Dobson) expresses boredom as he plots his crime. He offers to take her out to dinner. When she retires to doll herself up, Brynner, with salacious nastiness plastered on his face, takes a sip of champagne and looks in the direction she's departed to. He remarks to his partners in crime, spitting out each word like a series of drum hits: "A marvelous ... empty ... headed ... bitch!"!

Director Richard A. Colla, a prolific TV director whose camera-jockey skills were put to use on tons of small-screen police procedurals - keeps things moving quite briskly. The one-liners spit fast and furious and at times, the scenes in the precinct itself, are admirably handled with a kind of Robert-Altman-Lite touch. Overlapping dialogue, several conversations going on at one, lots of movement filling the frame, but the camera itself moving only in the most subtle ways are just some of the highlights of the picture. Even Altman stalwart Bert Remsen appears as a beleaguered desk sergeant.

And there are quite a few laughs. One of the funniest comic set pieces is a stakeout sequence with Reynolds (and his great 70s 'stache) and Weston (pudgy and oh-so cute), working undercover as nuns with Skerritt and Welch who are literally under covers in a closed sleeping bag pretending to be lovers (only they DO have a thing for each other). Everything that could go wrong, goes wrong, but in the end, the rag-tag cops get their man.

Another great comic set piece is the kind of politically incorrect gag that could almost never be done today where the guys sick a porky, sex-starved, middle-aged woman with an overactive imagination on Welch. Raquel is investigating a rape and this woman claims to have been raped, so she takes it very seriously while Reynolds, Skerritt and most of the other guys in the precinct are desperately trying to hold in their snorts of laughter while the "victim" (who has obviously visited the precinct many times) describes the most outlandish Harlequin Romance-styled rape perpetrated upon her. (Apologies to the politically correct, but it IS funny!)

Yet another politically incorrect gag involves the station Captain walking in on Raquel in the washroom as she's changing. He stutters and stammers his way through a conversation while trying to keep his eyes off her bounteous pendulums secured in a bra (for the PG-rating, of course, but also because Welch refused to peel down completely in any of her pictures).

In fact, many of the gags in the film ARE politically incorrect and often involve the sexist attitudes of the time (though I suspect not ALL that much has changed - especially within the domain of police precincts).

This all eventually converges during a thoroughly insane climax involving the sort of coincidence that can only happen in movies (yet in reality, often happens in real police work). Every cop gets their man at once and save the day! It's decidedly feel-good, though the ending suggests that the filmmakers anticipated a sequel (which never happened). This involves Yul Brynner as the main villain, "The Deaf Man" who, in the 87th Precinct books, is a recurring master criminal character who keeps trying to challenge the 87th precinct klutzes.

As a movie, Fuzz is relocated from Manhattan to Boston, but this doesn't detract at all from the picture. So many great crime pictures have been set in Boston, and even though Fuzz is far from anything resembling The Friends of Eddie Coyle or The Departed, director Colla captures enough cool locations that this, in and of itself, is one of the picture's highlights.

Besides, as McBain wrote - in mock Dragnet style at the beginning of all his 87th Precinct novels:

"The city in these pages is imaginary. The people, the places are all fictitious. Only the police routine is based on established investigatory technique."

It's the "police routine" that Fuzz captures quite nicely. Besides, it's an early 70s cop picture and even lower-drawer efforts in this genre with mild pleasures like this one are usually worth watching - if, however, you like this sort of thing.

I know I do.