FILM LIST
Fred Thompson. 112 mins. Marie Ragghianti (Spacek). a Georgia housewife and mother ofthree. leaves her husband and works her way through college. After graduating she manages to get a job in the Tennessee parole commission. where she soon comes to suspect corruption on a massive scale involving the State Governer. Her fight to bring misconduct to light proves to be not without its personal hazards. Glasgow; GFI’ 0 Mean Streets ( 18) (Martin Scorsese. US. 1973) Harvey Keitel. Robert De Niro. David Proval. 110 mins. Tony‘s Bar is the base for four young Italian-Americans. whose increasingly illegal activities lead to tragic events. Vividly observed character study which combines breathtaking technique with a pervasive sense of corruption. Keitel and De Niro give of their very best. Edinburgh: Filmhouse o Mishima: A Life in Four Parts ( 15) (Paul Schrader. US-Japan. 1985) Ken ()gota. 12()mins. Restrained. unconventional biopic of controversial novelist. Yukio Mishima. interweaving straight biographical narrative. stylised dramatisations ofexcerpts from his novels and a documentary-style reconstruction of his final day. Ambitious but a little cold. Edinburgh; Cameo o Mona Lisa ( 18) (Neil Jordan. UK. 1986) Bob Iloskins. Cathy Tyson. Michael Caine. 104 mins. l-Ioskins gives a heartrending much-lauded performance as the emotionally bruised ex-con gamer galloping into the corrupt Soho of contemporary London on a misguided mission provoked by misplaced love. A brilliant thriller/film noir/character study from the exceptionally talented Jordan. Absolutely not to be missed. Glasgow; GFT o The Morning After ( 15) fr) (Sidney Lumet. US. 1986) Jane Fonda. Jeff Bridges. Raul Julia. 1(15mins.See panel. Edinburgh; Odeon 0 My Life As A Dog (PG) (Lasse Halstrom. Sweden. 1985) Anton Glanzelius. Manfred Serner. Anki Liden. 101 mins. See panel. Edinburgh; Filmhouse o The Name of the Rose ( 18) (Jean-Jacques Annaud. West Germany-France-Italy. 1986) Sean Connery. F. Murray Abraham. 131 mins. Marvellous medieval mystery with the masterful Connery as a monk on the trail of a monastery murderer. Magnificent. Edinburgh; ()deon 0 New York New York ( PG) (Martin Scorsese. US. 1977) Robert De Niro. Liza Minnelli. 163 mins. Scorsese revisits the golden age of the studio musical with this elaborate personal drama. The seductive surface is redolent ofA Star is Born era. but underneath the Big Band nostalgia there lurks a characteristically bitter struggle Glasgow; GFI‘ O 1900 ( 18) (Bernardo Bertolucci. Italy-France-West Germany. 1976) Robert De Niro. Gerard Depardieu. Donald Sutherland. Burt Lancaster. 243 mins. The rise of fascism in Italy from 19()()to 1945 is seen through the
MY LIFE AS DOG
f}. . ‘So what?‘ is the question which unfairly comes to mind at the end of seeing My Life As A Dog. Untairly, because if Lasse Hallstriim’s moving story of a boy and his dog is all too familiar in a Growing Summer/Go-Between sort of way, it is also well shot, superbly acted and, it its incidents, extremely unusual.
For a start, its central character, 12 year-old Ingemar, played by Anton Glanzelius does not just own a dog, he pretends to be one — at least he does when the going gets tough. His mother is dying, his brother is morose and nobody, but nobody, appreciates his naturally boisterous sense of fun. lngemardoesn’twhine about it out he does occasionally shut himself off from humanity by kneeling down and barking.
The film becomes bizarre but not implausible when lngemar is sent to stay with his jolly uncle and aunt in the country. In an unconventional rite of passage into adulthood, he makes friends with an old man with a penchant forunderwear catalogues, a football-playing hermaphrodite who turns out to be a girl, and a busty blond working in his uncle’s glass factory.
Hallstriim’s direction is remarkable for its lack of sentimentality even at such times as when lngemar goes out to to buy his mother a toaster for Christmas, in defiance of the notion that she won’t live to receive it.
Says Hallstrfim, whose other work
has included a shamelessly mawkish family movie evoking the ‘simple Swedish traditions of Easter and Christmas’ in days gone by, ‘l was not worried about this film being nostalgic or anything. The ReidarJonsson novel was based in the Fifties, so the atmosphere just comes from that. My main worry was that with his mother killing his favourite dog and dying of tuberculosis, it could so easily have turned into a melodrama, treated in the wrong way.’
Hallstriim deliberately played up the boy's oblique perception of tragic events to avoid this. ‘It was a small part ofthe novel, and I made itthe whole theme -the guy’s way of dealing with reality by using humour and irony. I had a very happy childhood really, but I could sympathise with thatway of surviving.’
In fact the film itself avoids the blackest parts of the novel, by cutting out an ending which would have had lngemar returning to his mother’s house and living there on his own for a year in near despair. Instead, Hallstrdm allows the boy’s idiosyncratic homespun philosophy to carry him through even his darkest realisations at the film‘s emotional climax. ‘I didn’t want to end it like the novel — I wanted a happy ending.’ And, when the result is as thoughtful and uplifting an experience as this film, what can one say but ‘why not?‘ (Stephanie Billen)
lives ofa peasant‘s son and the offspring of a local landowner. both born on the same day at the turn of the century.
Massive. sprawling. left-wing epic filled with a mass of fascinating detail. Edinburgh; Cameo 0 No Mercy ( 18) (Richard Pearce. US. 1986) Richard Gere. Kim Basinger. 95 mins. Chicago cop (iere in the backwaters of Louisiana to track down his best buddy‘s murderer. finds himself falling for Cajun maiden Basinger. Formulaic stuff lifted out ofthe rut by Pearce’s stylish handling of the atmospherics.
Salon. 0 Nobody‘s Fool ( 15) «:r (Evelyn Purcell. US. 1986) Rosanna Arquette. Eric Roberts. Mare Winningham. 105 mins. The fictional smalltown of Buckeye Basin is the setting for this offbeat romantic drama. Arquette is a cocktail waitress who has become a social outcast among the local
community ever since she attacked her boyfriend with a fork in a Chinese restaurant.
Anyway. along comes a touring company of thespians with a production of The Tempest and Miss Arquette tumbles for the eccentric charms ofstage hand and lighting manager Eric Roberts.
Folksy Americana with some good performers. Glasgow; Cannon Sauchiehall Street 0 Notre Histoire (Our Story) (15) Bertrand Blier. France. 1984) Alain Delon. Nathalie Baye. Michel (ialabru. 111 mins. Aboard a train Delon is seduced by the mysterious Baye. Afterwards. they continue to live out each other's fantasies but is this really happening or could it all be a dream? And does anybody really care ‘.’ Glasgow: GFT 0 People on Sunday (U) (Robert Siodmak and Edgar G. Ulmer. Germany. 193(1) 80mins. Influential silent German drama covering a
lighthearted day in the lives ofa taxi-driver. salesman. shopgirl and model. Noted for its lively use of Berlin locations and for its employment of future greats like Billy Wilder and Fred Zinnemann. Showing with the 1929 short Rain. Edinburgh; Filmhouse
0 Personal Services ( 18) (Terry Jones. UK. 1986) Julie Walters. Shirley Stelfox. Alex McCowen. 105 mins. Suggested by the life. times and exploits onynthia Payne this ribald and engaging commentary on the British way of sex features a top notch performance by Julie Walters as the knowing yet somehow naive Madam. Glasgow; Cannon Clarkston Road. Cannon Sauchiehall Street. Edinburgh Cannon. 0 Police Academy IV: Citizens on Patrol (PG) fir (Jim Drake. US. 1987) Steve Guttenberg. Bubba Smith. George Gaynes. 87 mins. The old lags of the academy rally to the aid of their former commandant when he initiates a neighbourhood watch group programme and needs assistance to train selected oddball volunteers from the local community. Glasgow: Cannon Clarkston Road. Cannon Sauchiehall Street. Cinema. Grosvenor. Edinburgh: Cannon. Lothian; Cannon Falkirk. Strathclyde; Cannon Greenock. Cannon Kilmarnock. Kelburne. La Scala. ()deon Ayr. ()deon Hamilton. Rialto 0 Power of the Sword (U) No credits available for this cartoon adventure featuring the likesofIIe-Man and She-Ra arriving just in time for the children's holidays. Edinburgh; Dominion 0 Prick Up Your Ears ( 18) (Stephen Frears. UK. 1987) Gary ()ldrnan. Alfred Molina. Vanessa Redgrave. 110 mins. Wickedly tart. funny and moving biographical portrait of the seesaw relationship between playwright Joe Orton and his lover Kenneth IIalliwell. Brilliant performances from the entire cast and definitely one of the year's top films. Ilighly recommended. Glasgow; Grosvenor o Rebel Without A Cause (PG) (Nicholas Ray. US. 1955) James Dean. Natalie Wood. Sal Mineo. 111 mins. Moody. middle-class delinquent Dean is misunderstood by parents and peers alike but finds a sympathetic shoulder in pretty Wood. Seminal portrait ofalienated adolescence. Edinburgh: (‘ameo 0 Return of the Jedi (1;) (Richard Marquand. US. 1983) Harrison Ford. Billy Dee Williams. Carrie Fisher. 133 mins. Third in the Oscar-winning series rounds up this particular segment of the saga in a less than inspired fashion. Glasgow; Grosvenor. Strathclyde: Kelburne o Romancing the Stone (PG) (Robert Zemeckis. US. 1984) Kathleen Turner. Michael Douglas. Danny dc Vito. 105 mins. Retiring romantic novelist Turner is pitched into real high adventure in this highly appealing escapist fare. Edinburgh; Cameo 0 Room Willi A View (PG) (James
The List 26 June — 9 July 15