BOOKS
spent underground. As their new civilisation matures, however, the likelihood of war grows.
I Bill the Galactic Hero on the Planet of Robot Slaves Harry Harrison (Gollancz £1 1.95) This long-awaited sequel sees Bill stranded among alien robots and long-lost human colonists as he battles against the evil Chingers once more.
I Demon Lord of Karanda David Eddings (Corgi £3.99); Sorceress ol Darsheva David Eddings (Bantam £12.95) Parts three and four ofthe best-selling Mallorean. Garion and his allies continue their search for his son and travel further into unknown lands.
I Prelude to Foundation Isaac Asimov (Grafton £3.99): Nemesis Isaac Asimov (Doubleday £12.95) This Foundation novel fills the gap between the Robot/Empire books and the Foundation series — even fans may not finish it. Nemesis is unrelated to his future history and, given his dry style, is his best book in years. A dark star. is approaching Sol and its gravitational pull threatens vast destruction.
I lied Prophet Orson Scott Card (Legend £3.99); Prentice Alvin Orson Scott Card (Legend £12.95/£6.95) Two sequels to Seventh Son, one of the freshest fantasies of recent years. Set in an alternate 19th-century America, young Alvin discovers more about his powers and his mission in life but any final denouement still seems remote.
I The Harrowing oi Gwynedd Katherine Kurtz (Legend £12.95/£6.95) This is the first volume ofa new trilogy concerning the magical Deryni and the humans they battle with for control of the medieval land of Gwynedd. It follows on almost immediately from the Camber trilogy.
I Return to Eden Harry Harrison (Grafton £4.50) The final volume of the Eden series. in which the dinosaurs didn‘t become extinct and humans are beginning to challenge them with their more primitive weapons.
I The Black Tower Richard Lupoff (Bantam £3.99) This is the first volume of a series created (but not written) by Philip José Farmer. Initially set in Victorian times, Clive Foliott travels to Africa. still the Dark Continent, to seek his brother. He finds himselftrapped in Burroughs-like adventures underground. Future volumes will be written by other authors.
I The Drive-In Joe Lansdale (NEL £2.99) Thousands of teenagers are trapped at an all-night twin-screen horror movie drive-in and the action on screen is soon overshadowed by the gruesome and frenetic behaviour ofthe audience.
I A Pride ol Princes Jennifer Robertson (Corgi £3.99) Three princes of the shape-changing Cheysuli each attempt to fulfil their share of a prophecy in order to continue the battle against their race‘s enemies.
I From a Changeling StarJeffrey Carver (Bantam Spectra £3.50) Tensions run high between two space empires — experiments involving nano-technology on one man may lead to a scientific breakthrough and diffuse the tension. Reminiscent ofAlfred Bester at times.
I Wheel of the Winds MJ. Engh (Grafton £3.99) On a cloud-covered planet two friends are persuaded to help an alien recover his survival gear. To do this they must sail their ship offthe map and around the world. Enjoyable adventure/quest.
JustPubfished
New titles are given the once-over by Kristina Woolnough.
I Tracks Louise Erdrich (Picador £4.99) One of the best contemporary writers stakes a literary corner for her disinherited Chippewa Indian forefathers.
I At the Stroke of Twelve Various authors (Fontana/Collins £3.99) The final dozen contenders in the first Ian St James short story awards, a new prize-platform for unpublished writers. Solid stuff.
I Breaking and Entering Joy Williams (Flamingo £3.99) The roving lives of a man and wife who are tied and trapped by teenage obsessions. Highly commended Americana.
I The Moustache Emmanuel Carrere (Sceptre 3.50) A man’s moustache, or lack ofone, becomes the hinge between sanity and madness. Bizarre but readable.
I Intoxication Ronald K. Siegel (Simon & Schuster£15.95) Fascinating history ofthe human inclination to take drugs, plus what artificially-induced paradise has to offer.
I Borderlines Charles Nicholl (Picador £5.99) Travel-writer in search ofspiritual sustenance in Thailand finds hoods, adventures and illicit doings.
I Fatal Light Richard Currey (Faber £3.99) Clear, brief, powerful Vietnam War novel. clothed in virile prose and scarcely-stifled pain.
I Loving and Giving Molly Keane (Abacus £3.99) Decline of well-to-do family, with its effect on a spoilt daughter who gives her all to those who don‘t want it. Absorbing black comedy.
I Home Life Alice Thomas Ellis (Flamingo £3.99) More regurgitated columns from the Spectator, telling ofthe author’s daily ups and downs. I Collecting Himselt James Thurber (Hamish Hamilton £14.95) A hitherto unpublished-in-book-form bag ofwritings and drawings from the deceased American humourist who made his name in The New Yorker.
I Difficulties With Girls Kingsley Amis (Penguin £3.99) Nasty smug-chops Patrick Standish always manages to have his cake and stuff his face with it. Affairs, publishing and literary small-talk and infertility are the topics ofthe tale.
BEST OF THE 80’S/ VIDEOS
I don‘t suppose that fifty movies can adequately sum up a decade. but they can at least offer a flavour of the past ten years. Not that this list of recommendable videos is in any way definitive, shaped by the caprices of my own wayward taste, it’s also limited by the current video catalogue. Which means that there are very few foreign language films here, no room for the early Eighties achievements ofJean-Luc Godard or the post-Glasnost Soviet cinema. for instance.
At this point it has to be said that watching movies on the box is no substitute for visiting the cinema. The television screen is simply the wrong shape, and I personally find
distraction. Even so. video can be a valuable tool for catching up on the ones that got away, and just as the fast-forward is a helpful antidote to mediocrity, the ability to rewind and re-analyse any given scene is not to be sniffed at.
The following selection includes titles on sell-through and rental, and although we have tried to be as accurate as possible. it is a very volatile market and the video catalogue is constantly changing. Still, the discovery by the movie companies that, yes, people will pay a tenner for their favourite movies, means that the availability of movies on sell-through looks set to become ever wider over the next few years.
1980 ’
IAll ThetJazz(18) (Bob Fosse. US. 1980) Roy Scheider, Jessica Lange, Ann Reinking. Outrageously self-indulgent vehicle for choreographer/director Fosse’s neuroses has narcotics-addled Scheider as a hyped up choreographer suffering a heart attack mid-way through preparations for his latest extravaganza. Dance routines and open heart surgery intercut in Fellini-esque fashion to underline the heartlessness of ‘the show must go on‘. (CBS/Fox) £15.99
IApocalypse Now ( 18) (Francis Coppola. US. 1980) Martin Sheen. Robert Duvall, Marlon Brando. 153 mins. Vietnam as the Ultimate Trip. We follow [)5 Army assassin Martin Sheen downriver and deeper into the Heart ofDarkness ruled over by Brando's mad Colonel Kurtz. Alternately pretentious and visually overpowering (the Valkyries helicopter attack. for example) its grandiloquent folly somehow seems to get crazily closer to the madness ofconflict than the more documentary-inclined Platoon cycle. (CIC) £9.99
I Raging Bull (18) (Martin Scorsese. US. 1980) Robert de Niro. Cathy Moriarty. Joe Pesci. 129 mins. Middleweight boxing champ Jake La Motta finds it difficult to sustain his early success and as his career fades, he declines into a travesty of his former self. De Niro's stunning physical
the bric a brac in my front room a
presence dominates Scorsese‘s savagely bleak study ofself-destructive tnachismo. (Warner) £14.99
IThe Shining ( 18) (Stanley Kubrick. US. 1980) Jack Nicholson. Shelly Duvall, Philip Stone. Kubrick‘s
overwrought horror film dispenses with much of
the psychic apparatus of Stephen King's novel to
concentrate on the deeper -
horror of a family turning in on itself. Nicholson, with all the stops out , is bug-eyed and demonic as the father bringing much aggression to bear against his son. and the final scenes are, literally. chilling. (Warner) £9.99
I Atlantic City (15) (Louis Malle, Canada/France. 1980) Burt Lancaster. Susan Sarandon. Michel Picoli. 104 mins. Fascinating portraitofa resort in transition. as the old-time hoods find themselves losing control when the big money men begin to rebuild the gambling centres. Lancaster gives one of his best performances asa two-bit gangster on the
way out. who finds himself ‘ obsessed by a younger woman. (Video Gems) £8.99
I Barbarosa (PG) (Fred Scepisi. US. 1981) Willie Nelson. Gary Busey, Isela Vega. 90mins. An unheralded gem that struggled to get barely released. Australian director Schepisi's atmospheric western is probably the best example ofthe genre since Peckinpah. Nelson is perfectly cast as the legendary outlawearrying on a thirty year feud with a Texan family. Busey the farmboy being caught up in the action. (Channel 5) £9.99
I Blow-Out(l8) (Brian De Palma, US. I981)John Travolta, Nancy Allen. John Lithgow. 107 mins. Flashy. stylish.
desperately undervalued variation on Blow-Up, with Travolta‘s best adult performance as a sound effects man whose inadvertent recording ofa car accident swirls him into a life-threatening, politically motivated conspiracy. Watch out for adesperatelychilling murder in a public toilet, a patented de Palma 360 degree pan. and one ofthe cinema‘s most devilishly ironic endings. (Virgin) £9.99 I Mephisto(15) (Istvan Szabo, Hungary. 1981) Klaus Maria Brandauer, Ildiko Bansagi. Krystyna Janda. 144 mins. Hogen, one of pre-war Germany’s most famous actors. especially feted for his interpretation of Mephistophilis. sells out his left-wing principlcsin his greed for success and influencce when the Nazis take power. Gripping study ofambition and betrayal with Brandauer simply colossal in the central role. Winner of Best Foreign Film Oscar.(Pa|ace)£l4.99 I Reds(15) (Warren Beatty.L'S.1981)Warren Beatty. Diane Keaton, Jack Nicholson. 196 mins. The scope of Beatty‘s vast epic will be a little dissipated on the small ' screen. but its still hard not to be impressed by this ambitious picture of American activistJohn Reed which also considers the failure of the left in US political life, and offers a swirling vision of post-revolutionary Russia. While the love story element tends to distract one‘s attention,
Nicholson does make a i splendid Eugene O‘Neill
and Vittorio Storaro‘s
74 The List 22 December 1989 — 11 January 1990