The Congress

Director: Ari Folman
Year of Release: 1984

Writers: Stanislaw Lem (novel), Ari Folman (adaptation)
Cast highlights: Robin Wright, Harvey Keitel, Jon Hamm, Paul Giamatti, Danny Huston

Element of wonder ***
Level of Bizarreness *****
Visual Beauty ****(non animated) **(animated)
Counterculture Appeal ***
Story ***

I don't think she should be driving...

Best Quote...
Dylan Truliner: Robin? Can you see my dreams?
Robin Wright: Four cockroaches playing poker on your lap, is that a dream?
Dylan Truliner: Yes. But it's not mine.

Usually I talk about older films, but since this one is fairly recent, I have provided this short review to avoid spoilers...

It was pretty good! A bit slow at first but gets very weird, and if you like weird you might dig it. The story wandered a bit and I felt it might have been better if they had simplified.

OK here is the whole thing in case you really don't give a crap about spoilers....

Well, I have to say that when I first started watching this, I did not expect to be posting about it here. It just seemed like your run of the mill speculative fiction soft sci-fi romp. A nice little "what if" tale about the future of the movie business and what that will mean to actors with the added twist of having Robin Wright play a fictionalized version of herself. It is a subject that I myself have often wondered about as we get closer and closer to films acted entirely by Andy Serkis in every role. Harvey Keitel and Paul Giamatti popped up on my screen and I started taking this all a bit more seriously. Perhaps this was a very personal project for these people, it seemed like they were giving good performances and I could see how it could be an inditement of the industry that they had grown disillusioned with... Harvey Keitel certainly delivers some powerful words about the movie biz and how it treats actors, especially women

But then something very odd happened at about 45min in... someone slipped this film some acid and suddenly there were higher planes of existence to deal with, penis/vagina fish, fascist imagery, and more pop culture icons than you could shake a stick at! I mean quite abruptly, I was inside a Fleischer Studios/Ralph Bakshi influenced animated mind trip that could not make up its mind between being part of the animated sequences of Pink Floyd The Wall, or My Little Pony. OK... OK... I have trained for this. I mean, I started a blog about bizarre films for gods sake! I can take it!

Is that a gratuitous penis fish? or is this movie just happy to see me?

I watched it, I enjoyed it, but I do find myself wishing for a few things...

The animated parts were fine, but I was relieved when it left the animated realm. It wasn't that it was too weird for me, I think we have established that I LIKE weird. It was that it was too normal. I kept thinking who the hell is imagining themselves as a 40s style 2d cartoon version of this or that famous person. I understand that it could have just been her way of seeing the "other side", but really that Cool World vibe felt very played.

I want to read the novel it is based on... I strongly get the felling it should have been broken up into two films... one that dealt with the digitized actor plot, and a second film that continued the her story into the future and focused on the chemical revolution. As it was I felt it was trying to serve too many stories.

Dune

Director: David Lynch
Year of Release: 1984

Writers: Frank Herbert (novel), David Lynch (screenplay)
Cast highlights: Patrick Stuart, Sting, Linda Hunt, Some pretty boy too old to play a young Paul

Element of wonder *****
Level of Bizarreness *****
Visual Beauty *****
Counterculture Appeal ***
Story Depth *(ruined)

Best Quote...
Duke Leto Atreides: "I'll miss the sea, but a person needs new experiences. They jar something deep inside, allowing him to grow. Without change something sleeps inside us, and seldom awakens. The sleeper must awaken".

I loathe and love this film at the same time.

When you read up on the history of people trying to bring Frank Herberts masterwork to film, it could make lovers of the novel absolutely cry. So much missed opportunity, ego, and excess. In the end, poor Mr. Lynch tried... he really did. You can tell, and I respect his efforts! But I feel, he was in over his head. Human evolution had not yet created a Peter Jackson yet... well it had, but he wasn't finished "cooking"yet and was probably still working of some crap like Meet The Feebles. I just don't know if ANYONE could have done it at the time. So, I try to enjoy it as best as I can, and ignore the parts that make me twist up and grab the armrests bending my fingernails back because they are so far off from the messages of the novel.

The best "worst" moment of this film is Sting dressed in his silver-winged speedo screening "I -WILL- KILL HIM!" (wasn't sure how to punctuate his "weird, over the top, mental patient, all scream, battle cry" that he substituted for genuine intensity and acting ability.)

Oh Mr Lynch... you created the most beautiful piece of cinematic disappointment ever. So close... so close. Whats it called when you try to have an orgasm for 137 minutes and then realize you can't?... oh yeah, I think thats called Duneing.

The American Astronaut

The American Astronaut is a dark space-western/musical, directed by and starring Cory McAbee.



Cast
Cory McAbee as Samuel Curtis/Silver Miner
Rocco Sisto as Professor Hess
Greg Russell Cook as The Boy Who Actually Saw a Woman's Breast
James Ransone as Bodysuit


Imagine if you will a film that combines elements of David Lynch's Eraserhead with The Mighty Boosh and a thousand other things and you might begin to describe The American Astronaut. Bottom line is that it was weird, witty and I loved it.


Quotes: (Hard to pick just one)
Samuel Curtis: South America is where I'm gonna' go.
The Boy Who Actually Saw a Woman's Breast: Don't you fear the Yetis in Rio?
Samuel Curtis: No...


Samuel Curtis:What's the matter with him?
Lee Vilensky: Ah, you know how kids are. You sell 'em to a shitty planet, and they think you're the bad guy.


Samuel Curtis: Mind if I use your bathroom?
Eddie: Sure... It's a real toilet, so be careful.


Lee Vilensky:Gentlemen, you have all worked very hard. And among the lucky, you are the chosen ones. You have been sprinkled with lucky stardust. Yes, you have. For today, you have been chosen to reside in the court of the Great One. Gentlemen, I give you the boy... who actually saw... a woman's breast!

The Boy Who Actually Saw a Woman's Breast: It was round and soft. Now go back to work.


Ship Voice: What did your father teach you? What did your father teach you? What did your father teach you? What did your father teach you? What did your father teach you?
Samuel Curtis (waking up): My father taught me to kill the sunflower.
Ship Voice: Congratulations, Mr. Curtis. You are now awake. Two hours to Jupiter.

Robinson Crusoe On Mars

Place holder... Need to rewatch this one, I only vaguely recall it from childhood.

Brazil

Director: Terry Gilliam
Year of Release: 1985
Writers: Terry Gilliam, Tom Stoppard, Charles McKeown
Cast highlights: Jonathan Pryce, Michael Palin, Robert De Niro, Katherine Helmond

Element of wonder *****
Level of Bizarreness ****
visual Beauty ****
Counterculture Appeal *****
Story Depth *****


Best Quote: "Don't fight it son. Confess quickly! If you hold out too long you could jeopardize your credit rating."

Full Review to come...

Dark City

Director: Alex Proyas
Year of Release: 1998
Writers: Alex Proyas
Cast highlights: Richard Eff'in O'Brien! Kiefer Sutherland, William Hurt, Jennifer Connelly Rufus Sewell.

Element of wonder *****
Level of Bizarreness ****
visual Beauty *****
Counterculture Appeal ****
Story Depth ****


Best Quote: "Sleep... now" (Delivered by the fantastically creepy Richard O'Brian. To this day I can't put my computer to sleep without waving my hand in front of the monitor and uttering this line in my best Mr. Hand voice.)


Full Review to come...
One line place holder review: I think Rod Serling I think would have liked this film but I also think it would have creeped him right the fuck out. : )

An Andalusian Dog (Un chien andalou)

Director: Luis Buñuel
Year of Release: 1929
Writers: Salvador Dalí, Luis Buñuel
Cast highlights: Salvador Dalí!

Element of wonder **
Level of Bizarreness *****
visual Beauty ***
Counterculture Appeal ****
Story Depth N/A


Best Quote... N/A

I haven't seen this film in about 15 years so I think I had better find a copy of it before commenting in depth, but here is the extra short version based on my poor memory... Salvador Dali and another fellow dressed somewhat like priests laying on their backs dragging a piano with a dead mule draped over it across a room by ropes... peak your interest? heh.