FILM
FINDEX
IAn Actor’s Revenge (15) (Kon lchikawa. Japan, 1963) Kazuo Hasegawa. Fujiko Yamamoto. Ayako Wakao. 113 mins. In the early 19th century. an onngata (the kabuki theatre's female impersonators) takes revenge on the trio of men responsible for the death of his parents. lchikawa's confident use of the Scope format turns the screen into a succession of breathtaking Japanese prints. with veteran performer Hasegawa equally mesmeric as the central hero/heroine. Edinburgh: Filmhouse.
I The African Queen (PG) (John Huston. UK. 1951) Humphrey Bogart. Katharine Hepburn. Robert Morley. 105 mins. Splendid World War One adventure has the marvellous pairing of grizzled Bogey and spinsterish Hepburn as they make their way up the Congo fighting swamps. the Hun. and each other to quite thrilling effect. Great character interplay courtesy of film critic James Agee‘s gritty dialogue. Glasgow: GFT.
I All Dogs Go to Heaven (U) (Don Bluth. US. 1989) With the voices ofBurt Reynolds. Loni Anderson and Dom DeLuise. 84 mins. 1n Bluth‘s latest animated feature, likcable Alsatian Charlie Barkin is killed by his partnerin small-time crime. but manages to trick his
adventure with cute orphan Anne-Marie as he seeks revenge on his double-crossing buddy. Occasionally sloppy animation is more than made up for by the inventive story-line and an allusive sense ofhumour that should even have adults suppressing the odd guffaw.Strathc1yde: Odeon Ayr. I Another Time. Another Place ( 15) (Michael Radford. UK. 1983) Phyllis Logan. Gregor Fisher. 102 mins. Carefully measured rural wartime drama as a farmer's wife‘s unremitting slog in the Highlands is momentarily relieved by the billeting of Italian POW‘s and the prospect of romance. Central: MacRobert Arts Centre. ‘
I Another Woman'( PG) (Woody Allen. US. 1988) Gena Rowlands. Mia Farrow. lan Holm. Gene Hackman. 81 mins. Woody Allen continues in the serious vein of his last picture September. with another probing exploration of emotional and familial relationships. Here. successful scholar Rowlands is forced to confront the emotional vacuum of her life when she hears the revelations of another woman (Farrow) unburdening her anxieties in the psychiatrist‘s office next door. Edinburgh: Cameo.
I Apocalypse How(18) (Francis Coppola. US, 1980) Martin Sheen. Marlon Brando. Robert Duvall. Dennis Hopper. 153 mins. Vietnam as The Ultimate Trip. We follow US Army assassin Sheen downriver and deeper into the Heart ofDarkness ruled over by Brando's mad Colonel Kurtz. Alternater pretentious and visually overpowering (the Valkyries helicopter attack. for example). its grandiloquent folly somehow pierces right to the bone of the conflict. Edinburgh: Filmhouse.
I Back To The Future Part 3 (PG) (Robert Zemeckis. US. 1990) Michael]. Fox. Christopher Lloyd. Mary Steenburgen. 119 mins. After the elongated trailerof BTFZ we‘re back in 1885 for the third and absolutely final instalment of the series. in which Michael has to face up to longstanding enemy Biff and save the Doc from certain death. except that the latteris much more interested in falling for Mary Steenburgen. The end result is not quite a bad film. but. as with almost every other sequel ofa sequel there‘s an overall slackness which prevents it from lifting off in the way that it should. 1n almostevery sense. we've been here before. Glasgow: (‘annon Clarkston Road. Cannon The
way out of the Afterlife to face earthbound
DARK HABITS
Dark Habits (18) (Pedro Almodovar, Spain, 1984) Cristina S. Pascual, Julieta Serrano, Marisa Paredes, Carmen Maura. 95 mins. Such is the current UK profitability of Almodovar that distributors are searching even deeper into his back catalogue for movies that he made before he was, er, discovered by the great British public. Yet as this six-year old black comedy hits the screen, are we all beginning to suffer Pedro fatigue?
The answer is a kind of yes-and-no. Much of the time, Dark Habits is
thoroughly reprehensible, profoundly amoral, and very funny. Nightclub chanteuse Pascual flees the horror of her drug-addled existence to take refuge in the convent of the Humble Hedeemers, presided over by Serrano's explicitly frustrated lesbian Mother Superior, and ends up probably doing more drugs than she ever did before. The nuns lead a very sharing lifestyle: they share their heroin, they share their coke, and Sister Manure the acid freak even slips a few tabs into the food to make sure nobody feels left out. Oh yes, and Sister Sin plays bongos to soothe the tiger she keeps in the back garden. The Sound of Music this is not.
While the Spanish release of the film must have caused the late General Franco to vigorously rotate in his grave, one does wonder what the good councillors of Glasgow will make of it. Some may well be appalled, although the Free Presbyterians will obviously screen it in their youth clubs as a documentary, claiming that at last all their suspicions have been confirmed.
From the critic’s point of view, you’d have to argue that Almodovar’s aim, as in nearly all his films, is to prick the complacencies of our everyday morality, and here the unholy sisters do help the protagonist to resolve the crises in her life, even if their means are not exactly those endorsed by the Vatican. Having said that, the film does show its age a little, the plotting looser, the pacing more uncertain than he manages these days, but the extremity of its comic vision is not to be denied. Go on, take your Auntie Eadie as a surprise. (Trevor Johnston)
Forge. Cannon Sauchichall Street. Grosvenor. Edinburgh: Cannon. Dominion. L'Cl. Central: Allanpark. Caledonian. Cannon. Strathclydc; Cannon. Kelburnc. Odeon Ayr. Odeon Hamilton. La Scala. UCl Clydcbank. l,'(‘l East Kilbride.
I The Belly Of An Architect ( 15) ( Peter Grecnaway. L'Kfltaly. 1987) Brian Dennehy. (‘hloe Webb. Lambert Wilson. 118 mins. Distinguished American architect Stourley Kracklite arrives in Rome to mount an exhibition in memory of his 18th century predecessor Etienne Louis Boulee. Gradually. as his health deteriorates. he becomes convinced that his faithless. pregnant wife is tryingto poison him. A majestic performance by burly Dennehy adds a brutal emotional streak to this typically elegant Greenaway maze. which makes excellent use of sumptuous Roman locations. Edinburgh: Cameo.
I Betty Blue ( 18) (Jean-Jacques Beineix. France. 1986) Jean Hughes Angladc. Beatrice Dalle. 121) mins. Tcmpestuous love gone mad as an older handy man and a free-spirited woman embark on a passionate. pcripatetic fling that ends in tragedy. Filmed with a dazzling technique and an irritating emptiness by the maker of Diva. Edinburgh: Cameo.
I The Big Sleep (PG) (Howard Hawks. US. 1946) Humphrey Bogart. Lauren Bacall. John Ridgely. Martha Vickers. 114 mins. Marlowe gets caught up in the peccadilloes of the Sternwood family as he tries to stop a spot of blackmail. Needless to say. the broad knows more than she lets on. Witty. sultry. atmospheric. mainstreamfilm noir with Bogcy and Bacall doing their excellent double act. Glasgow; ('iFT.
I Black Rain ( 18) ( Ridlcy Scott. US. 1989)
Michael Douglas. Andy Garcia, Ken Takakura. 125 mins. Not so much theland ofthe Rising Sun as the land ofShiny Surfaces as adman extraordinaire returns to a set not unlike Blade Runner. However. some promising ideas are shunted to the sidelines by Douglas‘s sour and rather uninspiring heroics as the New York cop sent to Osaka to counter a counterfeiting ring. The whole perhaps confirms Scott as a master decorator hired to tart up a very obvious formula. Glasgow: Grosvenor.
I Blind Fury ( 18) (Philip Noyce. US. 1991)) Rutger Hauer. Terry O'Quinn. Brandon Call. 87mins. Rutger Hauer as ablind martial arts expert? That‘s right. a blind Vietnam vet who‘s out to reunite an old army buddy with his young son. and who knocks off the villains trying to stop him with the same cane he uses to cross the road. Simply accept this ludicrous premise and you‘re in for a violent. tastelessand. yes. entertaining hour and a half. Edinburgh: UCl. Strathclydc; UCl Clydebank. UCI East Kilbride.
I Blue Velvet ( 18) (David Lynch. US. 1986) Kyle MacLachlan. Dennis Hopper. Isabella Rossellini. 12(1mins.ln small-town Middle America. would-be boy detective MacLachlan finds a severed car on some waste ground. When the police shoo him away he decides todo some investigating of his own. A singular fusion of the cosy and the terrifying which blends kitsch and nightmare. B-movie detection and brutal sex to deconstruct oui complacent vision of normal society. This is film-making of remarkable imagination and skill. Edinburgh: Cameo.
I The BOOSN 18) (Harold Becker. US. 1989) James Woods. Sean Young. John Kapclos. 95 mins. Shelvcd for over a year before a release some months after
Becker's more recent. profitable offering Sea ()fl.()vt’.thisis another entryinthe ‘ current cycle of narcotics abuse sagas. as a Los Angeles real estate dealer turns increasingly to [he Boost when his previously buoyant financial fortunes suddenly plummet. Hy stcrically moralising melodrama. with a well-cast Woods twitchily over the top. Glasgow; Cannon Sauchichall Street. Strathclydc; U(‘1 East Kilbride.
I Breaking In (Bill Forsyth. 1989. L'SA) Burt Reynolds. 91 mins. Renegade Scottish director Forsyth teams up again with old Burt in a mildly amusing caper movie about an aging burglar who teams up with another. younger one. anxiousto learn the tricksol the trade. Burt is traditionally stylish. in .1 Sean Connery sort of way . but Bill has never really managed to recreate the cliarm-levclsof Gregory's (itrl- ‘eyen though it's what his reputation is made on. ( ~entral: MacRobert.
I Casualties of War( 18) (Brian De l’alma. US. 1989) MichaelJ. Fox. Sean Penn. Thuy 'I‘hu 1e 1le mins. De l’alnia's contribution to the ever increasing pile of 'Nam films concentrates on the dilemma ofthe new ‘cherry‘ recruit (Fox) when confronted with his comrades‘ gang-rape of a Vietnamese girl. The candycoatcd finale somewhat destroys the film's impact. as if it were merely a bad dream in the American conscience. An intriguing contribution to the pile. even if it doesn't make it to the top. (ilasgow: (if-'1‘.
I Chinatown (Roman Polanski. LS. 1974) Jack Nicholson. Faye l)unaway.John Huston. 131 mins. l’rivatc eye Jake (iittes takes on a routine casein 19371.Aand ends up uncovering more than he bargained for. Splendid conspiracy thriller with a handsome period look and a quite superlative cast. Despite rumours spread by Nicholson and Polanski. though. the nose-slitting scene w as faked. Edinburgh: ('amco.
I Cinema Paradiso (PG ) ((iitiseppc Tornatorc. ltaly France.l988) Phillipe Noiret. Jacques Perrin. Salvatore (‘ascio 123 mins. 'l'ornatoie‘s vision ofhis movie-mad childhood is a wonderful love letter to the cinema itself. Told largely in flashback. it traces the young Salvatore‘s infatuation with his village cinema. and his growing friendship w ith its projectionist (played to perfection by Noiret ). Essentially. it‘s ’l‘ornatore's lament forthc joyous movie-going experience of his youth and a recognition of the price we pay for our maturity. l99li ( )scar winner for Best l‘tife‘igll film. (ilaisgtiw : (if‘vl‘.
I Cry Baby( 12)(John Waters. LS. 1991)) Johnny Depp. Amy Locane. Susan ’l'yrell. j Polly Bergen. 85 mins. Sec feature. Glasgow : (‘annon The Forge. ('annoii Sauchichall Street. Edinburgh: ()tleon. 1‘('1.Strathclydc; l'(‘l('lydcbank.l?(‘1 East Kilbride.
I Dark Angel l 18) ((‘raig Baxlcy. LS. 1990) Dolph Lundgrcn. Brian Bcnben. Betsy Brantley. 93 mins. Dolph starsas all-action lloUston cop Jack ('aine on the trail of drug pushcrs from space w ho remove their eiicmicsby use ofkillcr compact discs. doutlcss featuring k-tel's tribute to Sydney l)cvine. (ilasgow': (‘annon Sauchichall Street. Edinburgh: ('annon.1J(‘l.Strathclydc: 11(‘1 (‘lydeliank. LI( lliast Kilbride.
I Dark Crystal (1’(i ) (Jim Henson. Frank ()1..L'K. 1982)9-1niins. The Muppet men branch out with this unoriginal children's fantasy surrounding the quest fora missing shard from the all-powerful dark crystal which must be retrieved to prevent evil consuming the know it world. Strathclydc; 1J('l East Kilbride.
I Dark Habits ( 18) (Pedro Almodovar. Spain. 1984) (‘hristina S. l’ascual.Julietta Serrano. (‘armen Maura. 95 mins. See review. Glasgow:(if"1'.
I Death In Venice ( 15) ( luchiiio \‘isconti. Italy. 1971 ) Dirk Bogarde. Bjorn
15 'l'he list 27 July - 9 August 199()