Miles. UK. 1981) Ian McKellen. Janet Suzman. 108 mins. DH. Lawrence finds himselfbeset by philistines and goes off to the sun because his TB is ailing him. New rejigged version ofa rather aimless biographical piece which was never up to much in the first place. Glasgow; Grosvenor
o Prizzi‘s Honour( 15) (John Huston. US. 1985) Jack Nicholson. Kathleen
3 Turner.Angelical‘luston.129mins.
Skilful black comedy directed with assurance by veteran Huston and distinguished by a rogues gallery of performances. Glasgow; Salon
0 Pumping Iron II: The Women (PG) (George Butler. US. 198-1) 107 mins. Slightly stage-managed but effective documentary on the finals ofthe women‘s 19831x>dy-building
. championships at Caesar‘s Palace , Edinburgh:Filmhouse
0 Radio On (PG) (Chris Petit. UK. 1979) Dave Beames. 11)] mins. ADJ drives from Camden Town to Bristol. intending to find out about hisbrother‘s death. Edinburgh; Filmhouse
0 La Regle Du Jeu (PG) (Jean
" Renoir. France. 1939) Marcel Dalio.
Nora Gregor. Jean Renoir. 113 mins. Amorous intrigues amongst the French middle classes during a weekend hunting party. Edinburgh; French Institute
0 Revolution (PG) (Hugh Hudson. UK. 1985) Al Pacino. Nastassja Kinski. Donald Sutherland. 125 mins. A personal perspective on the tumultuous time ofhistory in the making as citizen Pacino is swept
FILM LIST
EARTH, FIRE, WATER AND YANAGIMACHI
3... I. Fire Festival (18) (Mitsuo Yanagimachi, Japan, 1984) Kinya
Kitaoji, Ryota Nakamolo. 118 mins.
The last five minutes are real knuckle-whiteners. Tatsuo, a
lumberjack in his forties from a small coastal village, driven to some sort of
; mania after the rites of the fire festival
the night before, shoots his family then
, turns his rifle on himself. When I spoke to director Mitsuo Yanagimachi at last
into the events of the American War i . I handsome, popular guy with no reason to do such a thing. it was shocking but
of Independence.
Edinburgh: ABC. Glasgow; ABC (Sauchiehall Street)
0 The RightStum 15) (Philip Kaufman. US. 1983) Sam Shepard. Barbara Hershey. Dennis Quaid. exhilarating. panoramic paean of celebration to the heroes of the last frontier ofhuman endeavour-flight Winner ofa measly 3 Oscars. Edinburgh: Filmhouse
0 Rocky IV (PG) (Sylvester Stallone. US. 1985) Sylvester Stallone. Dolph
Lundgren. Talia Shire. 91 mins. East : meets West in the boxing ring as : southpaw slugger Rocky Balboa tackles Soviet superman Ivan Drago.
Edinburgh: ()deon. Glasgow: ABC ((‘larkston Road). Cinema. ()deon. Rio. Salon. Lothian: ABC. Regal. Strathclyde; Kclburne. ()dcon (Hamilton). Rialto.
o The Rocky Horror Picture Show ( 15) (Jim Sharman. UK. 1975) Tim Curry. lflflmins. Lively musical horror spoof. Appealineg perverse cult attraction. Edinburgh; Playhouse
0 Rust Never SleepS( 15) (Bernard Shakey. US. 1979) 1113 mins. My. my. Hey. hey. It‘s a Neil Young concert movie with the old droner and sixteen of your favourite toe—tappin’ toons. Glasgow; Grosvenor
0 StElmo's Fire ( 15) (Joel Schumacher. US. 1985) Emilio Estevez. Rob Lowe. 1118 mins. Seven recent college graduates. dull rather than magnificent. face their ‘freshman year of life'. Glossy. expensive liberal teenfare. Glasgow;
g...“ __-_~
year’s Edinburgh Festival, with the diligent assistance of translator Yoshi Tezuka, he explained the genesis of the project; ‘The idea forthe film came from a newspaper article about a man
' who killed seven of his family. I did
some research and found that he was a
in some way i felt I could understand the passion of a man over forty.’ Talsuo’s derangement arises out of the conflict between his close sensitivity to nature and the gods, and
; the destruction of the landscape all
I around him, which include plans to turn
, the area into a tourist marine park.
Yanagimachi elaborated; ‘I always kept in mind the recent history of
GET
0 The Shooting Party ( 15) (Alan Bridges. UK. 1984) James Mason. Edward Fox. John Gielgud. 96 mins. Langorous evocation of a country weekend in Edwardian England “on the eve of the epoch-changing World War. Blandly unoriginal but superbly performed by Mason and a fine ensemble. Glasgow GET
0 The Song Remains the Same (PG) (Peter Clifton. Joe Massot. US. 1976) 136 mins. A melange of fantasy scenes and footage of Led Zeppelin's 1973 tour. For fansonly. Edinburgh; Classic
0 Spies Like Us (PG) (John Landis. US. 1985) Chevy Chase. Dan Aykroyd. 102 mins. Dim espionage comedy with Chase and Aykroyd as two expendable agents deployed to distract the other side from the covert activities of the genuine article.
Prehistoric jokes. sluggish direction and routine performances make this an eminently forgettable expenence.
Edinburgh: ABC. Glasgow; ABC
Japan’s economic miracle which has been destroying our own culture in the process of modernisation. There must be something wrong in that. In one way Tatsuo is the hero as a man in touch with nature, like a tree, cloud, mountain, orwhatever. To have this kind of perception, living in harmony with nature, is what I wanted to describe.’
This sort of sensibility is born out of Tatsuo’s feeling of a close relationship
with the goddess of the forest, 3 part of .
traditional Japanese culture now virtually meaningless in modern society. ‘Japanese Shinto religion has no distinct dogma like Christianity. If there is a big boulder in the forest which the locals cannot understand it is regarded as a god; people put a sacred rope around a thousand year-old tree; a waterfall, or anything natural can become a god and take part in the life of the people. But many seem to just perform the rituals without belief really coming into it.’ Yanagimachi‘s hero, on the other hand, feels the power of the gods coursing through him, as evinced by the highly-charged outdoor sex scenes, but it is to prove too much
((‘larkston Road). ABC (Sauchiehall Street). Rio. Lothian; ABC. Strathclyde: ABC ((ireenock ). ()deon (Ayr)
0 Sunday in the Country ( PG) (Bertrand Tavernier. France. 1984) Louis Ducrcux. Sabine Azema. 94 mins. In the French countryside of 1912 an elderly artist is visited by his headstrong. beloved daughter and more down-to-earth son. Their presence causes him to look back in langour on his work and the nature ofhis family relations. Beautifully photographed this is a film ofsheer perfection that speaks some
universal truths in exquisite fashion. ~
Strathclyde; Haldane Film Society 0 Teenwolf (PG) (Rod Daniel. US. 1985) Michael J. Fox. James Hampton. 92 mins. Teen idol Fox inherits the family trait of lycanthropy in this paper thin
juvenile caper that scarcely exploits j
the comic potential of its central notion.
Edinburgh; ABC. (ilasgow; ABC (Sauchiehall Street). Strathclyde;
O CINEMA TIMES AND DATES PAGE 290
to handle for him.
Things come to a head with the fire festival. ‘They are believed to have originated over 2000 years ago in primitive society as a ritual of thanks for fire. Nowadays most of them are for the tourists, but the one in the film retains its power. For men only, it is a sort of coming of age of adolescent boys, so it can get quite violent. They wear sacred while clothes and carry god's fire. Nothing is explained, but what is important for the film is the men in white clothes, the fire, and the gods. These images give the idea of the very sacred, violent man in the film. ‘Tatsuo is enraged when the ceremony is not performed properly, and that it will be passed onto boys like Ryota, his sometime hunting partner, who in typically modern fashion shoots birds and kills fish with oil while Tatsuo prefers more traditional methods of catching his prey. It is too much. ‘Excessively sensitive, excessively passionate, a man like him is not like other people who could live to 70 or 80, and perhaps that’s why he shortened his life.’
The triumph of Yanagimachi's stunning film is that it manages to bring us into Tatsuo’s way of seeing through an achineg affecting portayal of the huge locations, where forested mountains sweep down to the sea. ‘i wanted to shoot somewhere I could feel the souls of the ancestors of the people who lived there. I asked the cameraman to photograph natural things, trees, clouds, and water, and make them as beautiful as possible. I wanted the composer to try to capture the essence of nature from the sound of the trees and the river. There is something very sacred about the sound of nature.’
Electric, religious, a film with an atmosphere like few others. It speaks of earth, fire, water, injecting the viewer with the delirious elemental power of the landscape. In a word, passion. (TrevorJohnston)
ABC(Kilmarnock). Kelburne. ()deon (Hamilton)
0 Thunderbirds Are 00 (U) (Gerry Anderson. UK. 1966) Scott. Virgil. Alan, Brains. Lady Penelope. 90 mins. The world‘s most advanced spaceship falls into the evil mitts of the villainous Hood. Can International Rescue save the day? Will you be able to spot the strings? Three guesses. Edinburgh: Filmhouse. See also Listings for Gerry Anderson films at the Assembly Rooms.
0 Tightrope ( 18) (Richard Tuggle. US. 1984) Clint Eastwood. Genvieve Bujold. 114 mins. Eastwood is New Orleans detective Wes Block. Investigating a series of vicious killings in the city's red light district he grows uneasy at the alarming similarities between himself and the murderous maniac at loose.
A tautly handled. provocative thriller with Eastwood giving a creditable emotional performance as a man faced with a crisis ofidentity.
i
i l l l
Edinburgh; EU Filmsoc
Viril‘iiC'IJSI 7 —‘ 21) Mar27