FILM
I AN ANGEL AT MY TABLE (PG) Jane ‘Sweetie’ Campion returns with a three-part television adaptation ot the autobiographical novels ol tortured New Zealand writer Janet Frame. screening in this country as one lengthy. accomplished Ieature lilm. See review. Edinburgh Filmhouse Fri 28 Sept to Tue 2 Oct.
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I AWOL (18)Jean-Claude Van Damme aka The Man With The Muscles From Brussels stars in another chronicle ol tights. listicutts and knocking people's heads in. This time he escapestrom the French Foreign Legion and they want him back. The best lilm ever made in the history ol the universe. UCls Edinburgh and East Kilbride Irom Fri 28 Sept.
I BAD INFLUENCE (1B)Ta|k about art imitating lite. Rob Lowe, the chap who likesto video himselt getting his rocks oil, is the devilish character who takes ambitious marketing analystJames Spader under his enigmatic wing. Belore too long, while his new-Iound buddy is linding new Iadylriends himsell. our Rob is reaching torthe camcorderagain. See review. Odeons Glasgow. Edinburgh and Ayr. Cannon the Forge and the UCI chain Irom Fri 5 Oct.
I CADILLAC MAN (15) Motormouth Robin Williams’ new, er, vehicle has him as a philandering auto salesman whose wicked ways are interrupted by the appearance oITim Robbins’ riled kidnapper and an ensuing hostage crisis. See review. Odeons Glasgow and Edinburgh, the UCI chain trom Fri SOct.
I CARNIVAL OF SOULS (15) One-hit wonder Herk Harvey’s revived 1962 chiller gets rescued Irom anonymity to stand as one ol the most inlluential genre pieces olthe 60s. See preview. Edinburgh Filmhouse Mon 8 and Tue 9 Oct.
I FRAME TO FRAME In collaboration with Glasgow School ot Art. this enterprising nine-week season on Monday nights
; sets out to explore the
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! sensibility. The lirst
I session hopes to putthe work at David Lynch into
7 perspective. See also Arts
} preview page. Glasgow
Film Theatre Mon 1 and 8
Oct.
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m PREVIEW INDEX: 17 LISTINGS: WEEK ONE 32 WEEK TWO 33
:— Good Companions
The tirst mainstream release to chronicle the continuing tatal ettects ot the AIDS virus on the gay community,
Longtime Companion otters an
emotionally approachable portrait ol courage and support in time at need. Taking Its title Iromthe somewhat euphemistic phrase Iavoured by newspaper obituary columns to describe the surviving partners ol gay men who die ot AIDS, Norman Rene’s humane, witty and moving drama tells the story ol a group at lriends and their reactions to the changes in their world Irom the moment in 1981 when they notice a small article in the New York Times warning at a ‘rare cancer’ attacking homosexual men. Bruce Davison, Mark Lamos and Campbell Scott lead an excellent ensemble cast through an episodic narrative that stretches over nine years to trace the responses at this band ol ordinary thirtysomething New Yorkers as they Iind themselves conlronting the threat ot terminal illness on an everyday basis.
Given the subject matter, industry caution manilested itsell in a number at ways. Funding, lor example, eventually arrived Irom the state-subsidised American Playhouse organisation ratherthan a big name studio, while major distributors were also reluctant to handle the lilm. Director Norman Rene recalling that ‘most companies didn’t know how they could market a movie about gay people who die and none at them are stars’, explains that there were also initial casting difficulties to be overcome. ‘We Iound a lot at very good actors to do the lilm because we had trouble getting movie stars to say yes,’ adds the 39 year-old veteran of the oil-Broadway stage. ‘Alter all, it was a group piece and we weren’t paying them very much. Usually stars want the movie to
be about them it they’re not going to make any money out oI it.’
With a mainstream audience in mind from the start, llrst-tlme lilm director Rene and his screenwriter Craig Lucas chose the middle-class New York milieu with which they were both tamiliar as the setting tor their group chronicle, and eschewing the dogmatically angry tone at a play like Larry Kramer’s milestone production The Angry Heart, the pair have chosen a much more constructive approach. ‘People in theirtwenties and thirties were suddenly laced with their own mortality and the mortality ol their lriends,’ Rene rellects, ‘and we overwhelmingly wanted to look at the support that began to grow in this community as people began to be responsible and take action.
‘Even those previously not involved in gay issues, prolessionals like doctors and lawyers, began to stand up as it lacing the crisis really did bring home to them what was important in their lives. In a way, Longtime Companion is trying to make people less atraid ol AIDS, to break down some at that Us and Them teeling that surrounds it.
We’re trying to show that you can lace it
and do something positive.’ (Trevor Johnston)
Longtime Companion (15) plays Glasgow Film Theatre from Sun 7 to Tue 16 Oct; and Edinburgh Filmhouse Irom Mon 15 to Sat 21 Oct.
Soul Chiller
One ol the unlikeliest, but possibly most welcome, movie reissue ol recent years has to be the sole Ieature ol
i Kansas-based educational and
industrial lilmmaker Herk Harvey. 1962’s atmospheric scarelest, Carnival at Souls. Mangled by an uncomprehending exploitation
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distributor on its initial release but now on view in a new lulIy-restored crisp monochrome print.
Striking glacial blonde Candace Hilligoss stars as a young church organist who’s rescued from drowning In a car crash belore experiencing a series at bizarre hallucinations when she moves to a new job in another town. Haunted by sinister Iigures and at times imagining hersell completely cut oil Irom the everyday world, she traces the source other dread to a mysterious abandoned carnival.
Harvey’s arresting juxtaposition ol humdrum small-town lite and threatening dinner-suited phantoms is an acknowledged inlluence on George Romero’s Night OIThe Living Dead, and while it’s not quite up to the mark at that established milestone, Carnival ol Souls’ halting moments at unease and cumulatively creepy gravity make it a genuine one-oll to savour in its own right. (TrevorJohnston)
Carnival ol Souls (15) plays Edinburgh Filmhouse on Oct 8 and 9.
Matter Of Life And Death
Director Jerry Zucker has a US megahit on his hands with the supernatural comedy drama Ghost. Trevor Johnston talks to the man with his finger on the public pulse.
Along with Pretty Woman and the upcoming, amphibian martial arts extravaganza Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Jerry Zuckcr‘s Ghost is one
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