Wednesday 12 December 2012

This Week...#5 (8th December to 11th December 2012)

From http://static.guim.co.uk/sys-images/Guardian/Pix/pictures/2012/7/12/1342108415938/Stephen-Dwoskin2-008.jpg

8th December 2012: Outside In (Stephen Dwoskin, 1981)

"This is probably a good time to mention Dwoskin's use of comedy: Outside In is a film that deals with disability but is also funny and even burlesque. Of course, only the disabled can use this mode to stage themselves as disabled characters. Bergson states not only that "a deformity thay may become comic is a deformity that a normally built person, could succesfully imitate." (Michel Barthelemy)

Going through many of Dwoskin’s feature and short length films within such close proximity to each other, I admit that my thoughts on them have varied as much the height of a rollercoaster fluxuates as it goes on in size. I will confess, with some guilt considering how personal they clearly were to the late director, that the autobiographic works were usually the least interesting. Outside In is the exception.

Effectively a series of sequences, comedic skits, visuals pieces and situations about how Dwoskin viewed living with the disability that left him in crutches or a wheelchair for his whole life, the film for the most part is consistently interesting, going from the hilarious to the serious, erotic to the abstract. Dwoskin’s frankness with his disability, where even letting a person pass him in a row of cinema seats in cumbersome, is refreshing as he had no cap to his thoughts on his condition and portrayed the situation in a variety of ways. Also unlike some of his other, least effective work, he made each sequence and piece stand out to emphasise the content of them; his use of repetition is the most effective example of this, especially with a piece where a maid cleaning Dwoskin’s rented room transitions from a stranger to having a physical relationship with him through a repeated interaction. When Dwoskin was this rigorous, from what I have seen in the last few months, it was considerably impressive as was the case with Outside In.

From http://s3.amazonaws.com/auteurs_production/images/film/mazes-and-monsters/w448/mazes-and-monsters.jpg?1305043246
9th December 2012: Mazes and Monsters (Steven Hilliard Stern, 1982)

Bound together by a desire to play "Mazes and Monsters," Robbie and his four college classmates decide to move the board game into the local legendary cavern. Robbie starts having visions for real, and the line between reality and fantasy fuse into a harrowing adventure. (IMDB)

Oh lordy, finally seeing this infamous film was grown inducing. It is far less the moral panic film about Dungeons and Dragons, and its ability to corrupt the youth of time, that I thought it would be, its drama softening the blow, but it’s still clear why it is the butt of jokes from actual Dungeons and Dragons fans. The problem is not necessarily the content itself but that it is all the worst tropes of a TV movie together. I hate the stereotypical TV movie in all it meaning – bland visual look, eye rolling moral messages or arch drama, fades to commercial breaks – and with the great exception of Salem’s Lot (1979), every film I have seen made for television was tedious or monstrously bland. This film deserves credit of Tom Hank’s first starring role, which he does try his hardest to flesh out, but his performance is sat within a really vacuous and, for fantasy gaming fans, insulting drama whose saccharine ballad sonically sums up its vast failings,

From http://horrorcultfilms.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2012/10/the-night-child-600x328.jpg
10th December 2012: The Night Child (Massimo Dallamano, 1975)

When a documentarian delves into the dark world of satanic art for a new film, he unearths a disturbing painting that leads him into a world of post-Exorcist Italo-Horror where cursed medallions, possessed children and the overwhelming power of the dark lord converge to create a visually stunning and wildly eccentric exploitation classic from Massimo Dallamano (Venus in Furs, What Have You Done With Solange?) (Arrow Film)

The Night Child begins for half of its running time setting itself up but once its slow pace starts to quicken in terms of the narrative, it becomes a good Italian gothic horror film, far from being a mere rip-off of The Exorcist (1973) it may look like on the surface. Continuing on from Dallamano’s Super Bitch (1973), it is a beautiful looking, atmospherically rich film that, like the film I will be writing about in a second, in is far better in quality because of this rather than having numerous scenes of gore.

From http://s3.amazonaws.com/auteurs_production/images/film/who-saw-her-die/w448/who-saw-her-die.jpg?1330366846
11th December 2012: Who Saw Her Die? (Aldo Lado, 1972)

A young girl is brutally murdered somewhere in France. Sometime later, the same thing happens to the daughter of a well-known sculptor. This time the parents (the sculptor and his wife) start investigating, and soon find they are in way over their head. Meanwhile, the body-count keeps rising as the killer now starts butchering all those who find out too much... (IMDB)

As said above, atmosphere and mood is far superior for me in my horror films than high body counts, which is apparent in this great giallo film. It is still pretty gristly though in terms of its story and its scenes of murder that, while not as bloody as other gialli I have seen, still cause one to cringe, matched by a plot that despite being convoluted at the end still entices with the clues it gives you like narrative breadcrumbs. The film is enhanced further by the evocative cinematography by Franco Di Giacomo which makes the Venice locations both luscious and oppressive in how the characters interact within them. Also worthy of mention is child actress Nicoletta Elmi who, by complete chance by me in watching these films one after another, appears in both this and in a main role in The Night Child. Her filmography is slight, but is full of very well known (and/or great) films that make her pretty significant within Italian genre cinema of the 1970s. 

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