Communist Party. Strathclyde: UCl East Kilbridc Film Society.
I accessione (15) (Lucino Visconti,lta1y, 1942) Clara Calamai, Massimo Girotti, Juan De Landa. Dhia Cristani. 139 mins. Visconti‘s first feature pre-empted the italian neo-realism movement with its steamy story of crime passionel — The Postman Always Rings Twice set in the Po Delta. Seductive but controlled, it was an early indicator ofthe auteur‘s intelligence and intensity. Edinburgh University Film Society.
I Pauline At The Beach ( 15) (Eric Rohmer. France. 1983) Sexual pursuits among the adults one summer in Normandy impose unfair pressures on the unfortunate teenager Pauline, whoseincipient relationship with a young boy suffers as a result. Closely observed characterisation and sensitivity are. as always with Rohmer, the movie‘s greatest strength. Edinburgh: Filmhouse.
I The Plot Against Harry (PG) (Michael Roemer. US, 1969) Martin Priest, Ben Lang. Maxine Woods. 80mins. Aftera year inside, Jewish New Yorker Harry Plotnick returns to the street to find that his once flourishing rackets are under threat from the Mob. the taxman. the parole officer and even his sister. And worse is to come . . . Cleverly shoton low-budget monochrome, Roemer‘s dark comedy is perfectly naturalistic with an amoral stance and an enjoyable spirit. Glasgow: GFT.
I Presumed Innocent (15) (AlanJ . Pakula. US, 1990) Harrison Ford. Greta Scacchi, Bonnie Bedelia. Brian Dennehy. Raul Julia. Paul Winfield. 126 mins. Courtroom drama with Harrison Ford as the upright state prosecutor accused of the murder of his colleague, Greta Saatchi. with whom he was having an affair. Raul Julia shines as the brilliant defence lawyer determined to get him off. Ex-lawyer Scott Turow‘s best seller gets the prestige big-screen treatment from veteran director AlanJ Pakula who returns to the themes of his 70s‘ movies The Parallax View and All The President's Men, in this thoughtful vision of corruption running through America‘s corridors of power. Glasgow: Cannon Sauchiehall Street, Grosvenor, Salon. Edinburgh: Dominion, UCl.
I Pretty Woman (15) (Garry Marshall, US. 1990) Richard Gere. Julia Roberts, Ralph Bellamy. 120 mins. in this hugely succesful comedy-romance , Gere stars as an unfeeling financial wheeler-dealer discovering he is human after all when he spends a week in the company of Roberts‘ downhome goodtime girl. Conversely, she rediscovers her self-esteem by flawlessly carrying off the role of his high society companion, so the audience can feel happy for both of them. The outline might be as hackneyed as they come, but
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specialist film books on the shelves seem to grow ever more impressive, though I'm not at all sure how one might manage to get through them all and still catch the odd movie. Still, while an all-inclusive round-up of 1990’s tomes for the cinephlle would require more space than is available here, the following offers a fairly subjective guide to the books this particular celluloid-obsessed reader has found particularly endearing or objectionable.
We already written at some length about the highly cherishable first volume of the St James lntemational
Dictionary of Films and Film Makers (St ‘
James £55), an engrossing and intensively researched series of essays on the most significant films in cinema history, but here's another recommendation as it’s surely worth saving up for. The Bloomsbury Good Movie Guide (Bloomsbury £17.99), on the other hand, seems a fine example of how not to put together a film textbook; its modus operandi (grouping together films on different themes for your viewing pleasure) of rather nebulous usefulness, its coding system arcane to say the least, and its occasional gaffes well nigh embarrassing.
Of the numerous offerings devoted to the careers of single filmmakers, a couple from the characteristically excellent Faberfiim list stand out; namely Francois Truffaut’s Letters (Faber £17.99 lt/b, £12.99 p/b), recording a lifetime of enthusiasm and perceptiveness that’s a lesson to us all, and Kevin Jackson's interview collection Schrader on Schrader (Faber £12.99), which allows one of the
FILM Depardieu). Bertolucci's marathon effort at popular drama (six hours in total), has been reviled as both glamorous epic and lengthy advertisement fortheltalian From "at m yeanhe sheer “mum of v- ,. _ .1 sci; _ _. .
1. American cinema's most uncategorisable talents to talk about himself at quite arresting length. at the year’s biographies i’ve admired Laurence Schlfano's painstaking excavation of the canon of the great ltalian aristocrat auteur Luchino Visconti: The Flames of Passion (Collins £17.50), though along with Nicholas Wapshott’s study Carol Reed: The Man Between (Chatto a Windus £18) it seems to cry out for a more combative approach to the directors’ films.
in this post-Final Cut era, chronicles of million-dollar Hollywood misfortunes always make for instructive reading, and l’d unreservedly recommend Peter Bart’s Fade Out (Simon & Schuster £15.95), a concise history of the disastrous financial and filmic dealings that
“Seesaw: :
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knocked out the once-proud MGM studios, to sit alongside the reissued paperback edition of William Goldman's Adventures in the Screen Trade (Future £5.99) on the discerning cynic’s shelves.
Lastly, a nod to Kim Newman’s Wild West Movies (Bloomsbury £12.99), an informed historiclst approach to the genre that lives up to its subtitle How the West was found, won, lost, lied about, filmed and forgotten and a trio of recommended film-related novels: critic Gilbert Adalr’s tale of sex, the Cinematheque and 1968 The Holy innocents (Minerva £3.99); Michael Tolkin’s exercise in Tinseltown paranoia The Player (Faber £3.99); and Philip Ridley's charming domestic fairy tale in The Eyes of Mr Fury (Penguin £4.99). (Trevor Johnston)
television veteran Marshall has just the right lightness of touch. Glasgow: Cannon The Forge.
I The Rainbow( 15) (Ken Russell, UK, 1989) Sammi Davis, Paul McGann, Amanda Donohoe, Glenda Jackson. 104 mins. Davis‘ young country lass is anxious to see something of life, and tangles with both lusty bisexual teacher Donohoe and faithless soldier boy McGann en route to sexual awakening. An unusually polite literary adaptation from our Ken, which pales sadly in comparison to The Devils, Crimes Of Passion or Women In Love. Edinburgh: Filmhouse.
I Raising Arizona (15) (Joel Coen, US.
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1987) Nicolas Cage, Holly Hunter. 94 mins. Married ex-con Cage settles down to a life of crime once more and remedies his wife‘s childless state by stealing a millionaire‘s recently whelped quintuplet. Exhilirating, live-action cartoon combining non-stop action, crazy situations and deadpan wit. This second feature from the Brothers (Blood Simple) Coen is a joy. Glasgow: GF'I‘. Edinburgh: Cameo.
I Rebel Without A Cause ( 18) (Nicholas Ray, US. 1956) James Dean. Natalie Wood, Jim Backus. Sal Mineo. 111 mins. Seminal youth movie has Dean as a sensitive but misunderstood kid battlingto communicate with his parents and caught in the violent struggle for self-definition. Though irrevocably dated by now, thisis still notable as the film that articulated the until-then unrecognised experiences and aspirations of a whole generation. and does of course contain our favourite nostalgia icon in full flow. Edinburgh University Film Society.
I Bepossessed (15) (Bob Logan, US, 1990) Linda Blair, Leslie Nielsen, Ned Beatty, Lana Sehwab. 85 mins. Ms Blair made her name by vomiting copious green ectoplasm, rotating her head and growling Obscenities in the voice of Satan. Now she returns in a silly send-up of The Exorcist which, despite the inclusion of a few nods to devotees of that still-popular barrel of fun, and a televised exorcism-athon, sets the sights of its humour far too low and leaves the intelligent moviegoer feeling a bit cheated. Glasgow: Cannon The Forge, Odeon. Edinburgh: Odeon,UC1. Strathclyde: UCI Clydebank, UCI East
Kilbride.
I Reunion (12) (Jerry Schatzberg, US, 1990) Jason Robards, Christien Anholt, Samuel West. 101 mins. Scripted by Harold Pinter from Fred Uhlman‘s novel, Reunion is an exploration ofthe personally destructive power of Nazism, as a New York Jewish lawyer(Robards) revisits Stuttgart, where he grew up in an exclusive boarding school and developed a formative friendship with a young aristocrat. Though the theme is not original, it‘s a superbly well made film whose momentary details are often deeply telling. Glasgow: GF’I‘.
I La Ricotta (PG) (Pier Paolo Pasolini, Italy. 1962) Orson Welles. 23 mins. Welles plays a greedy film extra in Pasolini‘s wry and beautifully shot commentary on religion and personal politics, made for an ltalian compilation movie called Rogopag. While filminga Biblical epic, he slips away for a bite to eat and ends up being crucified for his pains. Needless to say. the familiar accusations of pornography and blasphemy followed. Glasgow: GFT.
I Robin And Marian (U) (Richard Lester, US, 1976) Sean Connery. Audrey Hepburn, Robert Shaw, Richard Harris, Nicol Williamson. 107 mins. Elegaic and witty fresh approach to the myth has elderly Robin returning to Sherwood from the Crusades to find Britain in a bad way and Marian in a nunnery. First rate acting and a romantically sad ending lend it a sense of seriousness unusual to the genre. Edinburgh: Filmhouse.
I Rumble Fish (18) (Francis Ford Coppola, US. 1983) Mickey Rourke.
24 The List 21 December 1990— 10 January 1991