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June 1998, Week 2

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Subject:
From:
Scott Hutchins <[log in to unmask]>
Reply To:
Film and TV Studies Discussion List <[log in to unmask]>
Date:
Fri, 12 Jun 1998 14:36:48 -0500
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I must mention I have also seen Man with a Movie Camera_ and _Berlin:
Symphony of a Great City_.  I know these are available, but what about
others like it.
 
I find it interesting that we get _Dark City_ and _The Truman Show_ in one
year.  What does that say about our society when we make films about
entrapment in false realities.  I know there are other films like this,
but I'm drawing a blank on them right now.  This is much more specific
than "mindbending films," and I don't think Gilliam's really represent
this, except maybe _Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas_.
 
Yesterday I saw Michele Soavi's (as Michael Soavi) _StageFright:
-Aquarius-_ and I get to wondering about the stereotypes of the slasher
films.  This has an escaped mental patient named Irving Wallace killing
the crew of an avant-garde play about a homocidal maniac in an owl mask.
After the escape is reported, Peter, the director, further
sensationalizes the play by rewiting it about Wallace.  Bret, the gay
actor playing Wallace is bound while putting on the spare costume by the
real one, wearing the original.  He is apparently not killed for Wallace's
glee in having someone else kill a friend.  The film was excruciatingly
violent, but the cast was not played as cannon-fodder, and the scenes were
more gruesome and affecting because Soavi develops his characters enough
(aside from the comic relief old-young cops outside, the younger one being
an uncredited Soavi, at one point asking if he looks like James Dean,
which he does) that we even care about the greedy producer, and the
zero-tolerance director who keeps them locked up in the place (the one who
knows where the keys are is the first to go).  The character softens up
quite a bit, but gets cut up with a chainsaw, struggling vainly to defend
himself with an axe.
 
The film developed the plot and the characters to great effect, and
although I would say it is probably one of the most violent films I have
ever seen (except Demoni and Demoni 2).  I take it American films like
Paramount's Friday XIII framchise (which I have never seen any
of) stereotype all horror films into their
Facets lump of "guilty pleasures."  Aside from the Demons films, and
_Pumpkinhead_, I've never seen any horror film where the characters were
NOT interesting.  This film is not free of chucklable cliches, but the
point is that horror, at least modern has always seemed a pigeonhole
for bad films.  While I wouldn't say this is a great film, certainly Soavi
himself has made better, but this was his first shot, it is certainly an
interesting film; certainly not trash.
 
Scott
 
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Screen-L is sponsored by the Telecommunication & Film Dept., the
University of Alabama.

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