Yearly Archives: 2008

Check it out, Home entertainment

Killer Klowns from Outer Space

Killer Klowns from Outer Space
Killer Klowns from Outer Space

Format: DVD/Blu-ray + exclusive BR Steelbook

Release date: 15 September 2014

Distributor: Arrow Video

Director: Stephen Chiodo

Writers: Charles Chiodo, Edward Chiodo, Stephen Chiodo

Cast: Grant Cramer, Suzanne Snyder, John Allen Nelson, John Vernon

USA 1988

86 mins

For a trashy horror/sci-fi/comedy (thanks IMDB), Killer Klowns is inspired. It takes the simple (albeit done to death) idea of clowns being evil, but exploits that premise for all it’s worth. Victims are turned into candyfloss, inflatable balloon animals hunt people down while the Klowns fire popcorn guns where each grain turns into a carnivorous jack-in-the-box. This film is inventive, stylish and a joy to watch, just to see what crazy spin the directors are going to come up with next.

It’s the kind of movie you want to be mates with and it looks like it was just as much of a laugh to make as it is to watch. You can see that the Chiodo brothers put their hearts and souls into every detail, and the actors look like they’re having a great time playing their stock horror movie characters.

I say actors, but to be honest it looks like the brothers roped in a bunch of mates, whose only experience of acting seems to come from watching Saved by the Bell (especially the ice-cream double act, who really had to be the first to die). These performances could have polished a turd in a so-bad-it’s-hilarious kind of way, but here the hamming takes the shine off a genuinely funny script, which includes such deadpan lines as when Police Chief Mooney leans forward and growls, ‘Killer Klowns? From outer space?’ in true Police Squad fashion.

If only Lost would do this type of thing.

Bonus features on this new Arrow release include an audio commentary with the Chiodo Brothers, alongside behind-the-scenes footage and a making of feature, and interviews with stars Grant Cramer and Suzanne Snyder, composer John Massari and creature fabricator Dwight Roberts.

But all the popcorn guns and hilarious dialogue can’t hide the fact that the film is fundamentally flawed. It’s just not scary. Despite the Spitting Image-style animatronic Klown-heads and their fantastically diverse methods of destruction, they are ultimately soulless, superficial and dare I say it, boring. The wonderful gadgets gloss over the fact that these bad guys have the personality of an envelope. There is no feeling of triumph when the people start to fight back, and the climax feels like just another sexy set-piece rather than anything momentous. Hell, I even got the feeling that if only our heroes would just ignore them they’d probably go away on their own.

Which is a real shame.

It’s still a great romp though. And after a few beers and pizza, it’ll make a fantastic climax to any house party. It’ll give Anchorman a breather at any rate.

High-five for candyfloss.

This review was first published for Optimum’s DVD release of Killer Klowns in 2008.

Oli Smith

Home entertainment

KING OF NEW YORK

2 Comments
King of New York

Format: DVD

Release date: 22 September 2008

Distributor: Arrow Films

Director: Abel Ferrara

Writer: Nicholas St John

Cast: Christopher Walken, Laurence Fishburne, Wesley Snipes, Steve Buscemi

Italy/USA 1990

99 mins

The Fun Lovin’ Criminals took it as the title of one of their tracks and it’s not much of an exaggeration to say Biggie Smalls claimed to be it every other line in his raps, but the popular use of the phrase ‘King of New York’ originates with Abel Ferrara’s 1990 film about a drug lord who eliminates his competition in order to make enough money to save a Harlem hospital. At long last, King of New York gets the special edition treatment this month.

Frank White (Christopher Walken) has had years in prison to think about his life and articulate the motivations behind his bloody campaign for redemption. On his release, he argues that crime has increased without his controlling influence, that drugs are a problem endemic to society and that he’s just a businessman trying to give something back to the community. Of course, Frank is a psychopath and his arguments aren’t convincing, but it’s a great part for Walken, who revels in the contradictions of the character. Frank is a traditional Italian-American mob boss, but he’s also progressive in the sense that he allows both blacks and women in his gang. Laurence Fishburne’s performance as Frank’s number one guy Jimmy Jump, a black man fully emancipated by virtue – or should that be vice? – of being a sociopath, hasn’t dated well – more Fresh Prince than fresh – but does retain some of its original power and is still eminently quotable.

As well as being notable for early appearances by Fishburne, Wesley Snipes and Steve Buscemi, King of New York has a great hip hop soundtrack featuring Schooly D. The action is hit and miss, but the cinematography is remarkable and is the best element in the film. Never before had New York looked so sinister, nor has it since.

Despite the satisfying weight of the SteelBook case, this ‘special edition’ is disappointingly light on extras. The second disc fails entirely to justify itself, containing only a handful of repetitive documentaries recycled from previous releases and TV. In the director’s commentary, Ferrara comes across as technically brilliant, but personally repulsive. With a mixture of nostalgic enthusiasm and reluctant obligation – he starts out saying he’s only doing the commentary because he’s been handed a few thousand dollars in cash – he points out killer shots, explains how they were achieved, then leches over the female cast members. Still, King of New York is a worthy addition to the Italian-American gangster section of any DVD library.

Alexander Pashby

Home entertainment

BABYLON

Babylon

Format: DVD

Release date: 13 October 2008

Distributor Icon Home Entertainment

Director: Franco Rosso

Writers: Franco Rosso, Martin Stellman

Cast: Brinsley Forde, Karl Howman, Trevor Laird

UK/Italy 1980

95 mins

In a Brixton basement somewhere, the little LCD clock hanging precariously on the wall above the speaker stacks vibrates with the same heavy bassline that moves everything else around it: the walls, the people, culture; it reverberates so much that the time it is supposed to show is rendered illegible, a thing of no consequence.

Set in the pre-gentrified soundscape of Brixton, tuned in to the bass frequencies of the black community resisting in apnoea under the repressive yet unstable surface of British history at a critical juncture of its development, Babylon is a shamefully forgotten masterpiece of (British) cinema. The magic of the film comes from the brilliantly orchestrated transposition onto celluloid of the socially conscious culture fostered by the sound systems, back in the Caribbeans, and later in England; here the MC is replaced by the filmmaker, the microphone by a camera, and the physicality of the bass is rendered through the livid intensity of the images.

Rarely screened after its release and never issued before on DVD, Babylon was directed by Franco Rosso, an Italian immigrant who considers England his home. It is perhaps his status as an outsider that allowed the director such an empathetic, insightful look into a culture that he felt close to, and that he believed needed to be represented on film in order to be preserved from the homogenising tentacles of the establishment.

Institutions were indeed far from tolerant, let alone understanding. The BBC refused to produce the film while The Guardian‘s Molara Ogundipe-Leslie criticised Franco Rosso for not being best placed to provide an accurate description of the black community: ‘If there are funds for the making of such films as Babylon, should they not be awarded to black film-makers? Or, could non-black film-makers work more closely at the conceptual level with black artists and intellectuals who know their people better and who can define their own reality more truthfully?’ As the shooting began the unions refused to accept the labour of young Jamaican workers not unionised (interestingly enough, Melvin Van Peebles experienced a similar problem on the set of Sweetback).

But when the London screens were taken over by the lights and sounds pounding out of this cinematic sound-clash, the response was solid and righteous, the black community liked it, and those outside were, as Rosso put it, ‘forced to, for a very short time, accept and open the doors’ (interview by Dave Philips in the first and only issue of New Britain).

The story of the vicissitudes and frustrations of young people faced with an intolerant British society, Babylon remains as uncompromising as it was back in 1980, with time adding an extra layer of historical significance to the film. Babylon – the sinful capital of consumerism and corruption for Rastafarians – is the backdrop for the daily life of Blue (played by the lead singer of Aswad Brinsley Forde) and his Ital Lion crew in the run-up to a sound-system battle against the rival group Jah Shaka. In only 95 minutes, the film manages to expose the audience to the daily injustices suffered by ethnic minorities through its wide range of characters and situations while avoiding any moralising bombast. As the story progresses, Blue finds himself increasingly stranded on the margins of society and his plight is representative of a whole generation of black people told to ‘go back home’ after having been exploited for cheap labour; but, as one of the characters points out: ‘this is my fucking home!’

Against the Sus law, the racism of the National Front and the cowardly silence of progressive liberals, the only weapon left to the characters of Babylon is the music, and they wield the subwoofer as a political tool to fight the violent bigotry of British society. As a result, the soundtrack in Babylon represents more than a mere melodic accompaniment and functions as a narrative device punctuating the montage, becoming part of the materiality of the film and subverting its usual role of comment ‘lost’ between the expressive content and the stylistic form of the film.

The DVD comes with the documentary Dread, Beat an’ Blood as an extra. Also directed by Rosso, this documentary portrays the art and times of insurgent dub poet Linton Kwesi Johnson, a friend of the director and his guide to the sound systems scene. The Babylon DVD presents essential views whose long unavailability should make us reflect upon the inestimable value that different cultures could represent in a real multi-cultural society.>

Celluloid Liberation Front

Cinema releases

DEATH RACE

Death Race

Format:Cinema

Release date: 26 September 2008

Venues: Nationwide

Distributor Universal

Director: Paul WS Anderson

Writers: Paul WS Anderson, Robert Thom, Charles B Griffith, Ib Melchior

Cast: Jason Statham, Joan Allen, Ian McShane

USA 2008

89 mins

Inspired by the Roger Corman-produced Death Race 2000 (1975), the new version of Death Race, also produced by Roger Corman, is directed by Paul WS Anderson, a filmmaker whose career has consisted mostly of remakes of projects with pre-existing cult followings (including computer game adaptations such as Resident Evil, and a thematic sequel to Blade Runner called Soldier), which have more often than not disappointed the fans. Stripping away everything from the original Death Race 2000 apart from the character names and basic plot, Anderson’s Death Race is a slick, polished B-movie that technically is a better film than the original, but lacks the shock value, innovation and critical edge of its predecessor.

In fact, Death Race seems to be much more influenced by computer games than by the movie it takes its title from – which should perhaps not be surprising, considering Anderson’s career so far. The action has been relocated to a prison, with inmates racing around an enclosed track that includes the kind of ‘power-ups’ – shields, weapons, death traps, all activated by driving over illuminated circles – that have until now been seen only in games. As the original Death Race had a big influence on computer games such as Carmageddon and Grand Theft Auto, it seems that things have come full circle.

With its reference to the Corman/Bartel original, its video game stylings and its mixing of genres – sci-fi, horror, action – Death Race clearly nods towards cult cinema, yet when the word ‘cult’ is mentioned, Anderson rejects the idea, claiming that ‘when a movie makes close to $200 million worldwide, it’s beyond a cult level’. Unlike the original film, the new version benefited from a massive budget and its attendant publicity machine. However, while Anderson is so keen to distance his film from cult cinema, it is precisely the limited means of many B-movies that allowed filmmakers to take risks and be innovative. Predictably, if depressingly, Anderson’s big budget means he just plays it safe.

Alex Fitch

Read the rest of the feature in our autumn print issue. The theme is cruel games, from sadistic power play in Korean thriller A Bloody Aria to fascist games in German hit The Wave and Stanley Kubrick’s career-long fascination with game-playing. Plus: interview with comic book master Charles Burns about the stunning animated film Fear(s) of the Dark and preview of the Raindance Festival. And don’t miss our fantastic London Film Festival comic strip, which surely is worth the price of the issue alone!

Cinema releases

ASHES OF TIME REDUX

1 Comment
Ashes of Time Redux

Format: Cinema

Release date: 12 September 2008

Venues: Curzon Soho, Renoir Cinema (London) and selected key cities

Distributor Artificial Eye

Director: Wong Kar Wai

Based on: Louis Cha’s novel Eagle Shooting Heroes

Cast: Jacky Cheung, Leslie Cheung, Maggie Cheung, Carina Lau, Tony Leung, Brigitte Lin

Hong Kong/China 2008

93 minutes

After Wong Kar Wai’s ill-advised American venture My Blueberry Nights last year, the re-release of his 1994 Ashes of Time is a welcome reminder of his sheer virtuosity as a filmmaker. Until now, the film was virtually impossible to get hold of, and the director has pieced together a definitive version from negatives scattered across Hong Kong and various Chinatown cinemas. Re-edited and re-scored, the film, set in the world of period martial arts, is a poetic meditation on love and solitude, at once utterly contemporary and firmly rooted in the Buddhist canon.

The film is inspired by Louis Cha’s classic 1950s novel, Eagle Shooting Heroes (also known as Legend of the Condor Heroes), part of a literary tradition that dates back to the Ming Dynasty. Both the novel and the film are striking examples of wuxia – martial arts chivalry, a genre that has become popular in the West thanks to films like Ang Lee’s Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon and Zhang Yimou’s Hero, which clearly owe a debt to Ashes of Time (the fact that Christopher Doyle was also the cinematographer on Hero makes the comparison all the more striking). But though the film delivers a handful of the requisite action scenes, Wong Kar Wai devotes his energy to exploring the subtle intricacies of human nature, beautifully captured in the film.

Ashes of Time imagines Cha’s protagonists Ouyang Feng and Huang Yaoshi as young men, before they become the infamous Lord of the West and Lord of the East in the novel. The late Leslie Cheung delivers a wonderfully assured performance as Ouyang Feng, a man who lives in virtual isolation on the edge of the Western desert, having fled his home after the woman he loved (played by Maggie Cheung) married his older brother. Now acting as a middleman, he matches clients looking for retribution with swordsmen-for-hire. He becomes ever more aware of his own solitude as his life intersects with those of the damaged people he encounters, including Yaoshi, a good friend now determined to drink his memories away.

The film is built as a triptych that follows the changing seasons, and Wong Kar Wai rejects a traditional narrative structure in favour of beautifully crafted scenes, with tight close-ups of his characters interspersed with evocative desert panoramas. And though the film can be hard to follow (watching the movie after a couple of glasses of red wine is not a great idea), the second time around the somewhat fragmented scenes coalesce into an intense reverie.

Though the temporal and physical setting is strikingly different to Wong Kar Wai’s habitual neon-lit cities, this film unmistakably bears his hallmark: an obsession with love, both unrequited and lost. The respect and devotion he shows to his actors is rewarded by terrific performances, and, as always, his partnership with Christopher Doyle delivers gorgeous, dynamic cinema. The release of Ashes of Time Redux may be debated by purists, but it’s an exciting opportunity to see an example of Wong Kar Wai’s early work on the big screen.

Sarah Cronin

Cinema releases

HEAVY METAL IN BAGHDAD

Heavy Metal in Baghdad

Format: Cinema

Release date: 12 September 2008

Venue: ICA Cinema(London) and key cities

Distributor: Slingshot Studios

Director: Suroosh Alvi & Eddy Moretti

USA 2007

84 mins

Eddy Moretti and Suroosh Alvi’s powerful yet soft-centred documentary about the Iraqi metal band Acrassicauda creates a fascinating portrait of life in Iraq as seen through the eyes of young metal-heads who struggle not merely to survive in a war zone but to practise their music and get a few gigs organised. The film was born out of an article by MTV reporter Gideon Yago, which featured Acrassicauda, published in Vice Magazine shortly after the fall of Saddam Hussein’s regime. Alvi, Vice Magazine co-founder, and Moretti, head of Vice Film, stayed in email contact with the band and eventually embarked on a journey to Baghdad in 2006 to find them, wondering if they were still alive. Due to the difficulties and dangers involved in arranging and shooting the interviews, Heavy Metal in Baghdad unfolds in the form of a low-tech, fragmented video diary narrated by Moretti.

The interviews with the band are interspersed with news-like footage of the night bombings and daily routine on the streets during the early days of the war. We get introduced to four of the original five members as they are just about to play a concert in a maximum security hotel block in Baghdad in the summer of 2005. The situation is intense, and the stories they tell are relentlessly bleak, although far less horrifying than those found in other parts of Iraq. Firas, Tony, Marwan and Faisal are a group of frank and immensely likable boys who have grown up with Metallica and Slayer songs, watching Hollywood films to practise their English. Stuck in the middle between the troops and the terrorists, they have learned to deal with their plight, and heavy metal provides them with both solace and a sense of purpose. It is recreation, ritual and cultural expression even if they can’t grow their hair long or indulge in any head-banging for fear of being denounced as Satan-worshippers.

After receiving death threats from rebels and religious fundamentalists, the band decide to leave Baghdad, but reunite in Damascus where they are able to play a small concert in an internet café. Encouraged by the reaction of the meagre audience and the support they receive from Vice, they eventually manage to record three songs in a studio, which revives their dreams of a great career as musicians with hopes to tour around America with their heavy metal heroes, playing to large crowds and growing long hair.

There is a suitable sense of anger coursing through Heavy Metal in Baghdad as the film depicts their lack of freedom and the circumstances that lead to the band becoming refugees, first in Damascus, and currently in Turkey, and the two filmmakers cannot be accused of shrinking away from uncomfortable material. However, the compelling insights and anecdotes conveyed through the interviews are undermined by Moretti’s annoying and repetitive comments on how extremely dangerous and stupid it was of the two filmmakers to go on this risky mission and travel around Baghdad with a group of hired bodyguards. In spite of this small gripe, Heavy Metal in Baghdad is a disturbing and riveting document of Acrassicaudas’s remarkable drive and courage as well as a touching reminder that music can offer a sanctuary to oppressed people.

Pamela Jahn

Cinema releases

THE GIRL WHO LEAPT THROUGH TIME

2 Comments
The Girl Who Leapt Through Time

Format: Cinema

Release date: 19 September 2008

Venue: ICA (London)

Distributor: Manga Entertainment

Director: Mamoru Hosoda

Writers: Yasutaka Tsutsui & Satoko Okudera

Original title: Toki o kakeru sh텍jo

Cast: Riisa Naka, Takuya Ishida, Mitsutaka Itakura, Ayami Kakiuchi, Mitsuki Tanimura

Japan 2006

98 mins

From the writer of Paprika comes the finest Japanese animé released in the UK so far this year. A beguiling and affecting mix of lost love, alternate time-lines and near-death experiences, TokiKake (to use its colloquial Japanese title) tells the tale of a high school girl who picks up a device left behind by a time traveller and gets given the power to leap back through time and change history. At first Makoto uses the power for the most frivolous of reasons – revisiting favourite afternoons and even popping back for a particularly nice dinner – but then starts to meddle in the lives and love lives of her classmates.

In the West, one suspects the telling of this kind of story would be fairly twee but Japanese manga and animé aimed at tweenage audiences, particularly female ones, is amongst the most sophisticated. In fact, the definition of sh텍jo (meaning little girl) manga / animé in the US has been appropriated to mean stories that have an appeal to both genders and tends to deal with real-life situations and concerns. Although TokiKake is obviously sci-fi, it deals with its subject matter sensitively and looks at the moral and personal repercussions that such a power to change history might have. As such, it recalls two popular Western time travel tales, the TV series Quantum Leap and the brilliant comedy Groundhog Day. Like QL, it deals with the responsibility a time traveller might have, as changing a single person’s life might affect the lives of others. The void that Makoto travels though – criss-crossed with black stripes representing years and timelines – is also reminiscent of some of the visual tropes of the series. The repetitious aspects of Makoto’s travels and her attempts to make things better also recall Bill Murray’s at first hedonistic and eventually self-improving changes to reality in Groundhog Day.

However, it’s entirely possible that the creators of Quantum Leap and Groundhog Day may have themselves been influenced by the original novel on which TokiKake is based. In Japan, at least, it’s a book that has achieved cult status and has been adapted previously as two live action films, a TV series and a short film in the last 25 years. In fact, the only frustrating aspect of this new version is that it feels like it’s part of a larger story; indeed, this new version is both a remake of and sequel to a previous adaptation. As the story deals with revisiting the same period over and over again it is somewhat apt that each film is connected to the last – the 1997 adaptation is narrated by the actress who played the heroine in the film from 1983 while Makoto’s aunt in this film may very well be the lead character from 97…

This element shouldn’t put off casual viewers though as the subtlety of the animation and elegant layout of many scenes make this a film to be commended for its aesthetics alone, before even considering the intelligent script and engaging characterisation. Like Paprika, it tells the tale of a seemingly normal girl with a fantastic alter ego who is needed to stop a catastrophe (in every sense of the word) from happening and has to put her personal concerns to one side. As you might expect from a time-travel drama, her story is left somewhat open-ended, and while there are already a variety of print and live action prequels, I’d be more than happy to see another instalment to find out what happens next.

Alex Fitch

Cinema releases

THE CHASER

The Chaser

Format: Cinema

Release date: 19 September 2008

Venues: Cineworld Shafts Ave, Vues Islington + Sheperd’s Bush (London) and key cities

Distributor: Metrodome

Director: Na Hong-jin

Writers: Hong Won-chan, Lee Shinho, Na Hong-jin

Original title: Chugyeogja

Cast: Kim Yun-seok, Ha Jung-woo, Seo Yeong-hie

South Korea 2008

125 mins

From first-time director Na Hong-jin comes a film that is part Seven, part 24. Joong-ho (Kim Yun-seok) is an ex-cop turned pimp whose call-girls have recently gone missing. He assumes they ran away from the night business until he tracks their bookings back to one client in particular; enter a psychopathic serial killer who keeps the girls in the basement of his house, torturing them calmly till they die – during one gruesome scene, in an intense close-up shot, he takes a hammer and chisel to the head of his latest victim, Mi-jin (Seo Yeong-hie, Shadows in the Palace), who wriggles in distress whilst the hammer blows come down.

Suspense builds after Joong-ho catches the killer and takes him to the police station, only to find himself accused of assault and impersonation of a police officer while the killer is freed. Not only is the chase on again, but Mi-jin is still slowly bleeding to death in the basement, preying on Joong-ho’s conscience. By the time the police realise that they let the real killer go, Joong-ho is already in the field, a few steps ahead of them, working alone, Jack Bauer-style.

Kim Yun-seok gives an excellent performance as the tough pimp who softens up and genuinely takes responsibility, feeling he has a duty of care for his charges. Filmed mostly at night and with many hand-held sequences, The Chaser is a highly polished and accomplished first film for Na Hong-jin. The suspense is taut throughout, and the plot satisfyingly complex.

A massive success in its native South Korea, The Chaser has generated endless discussions on internet forums between those who see it as just a rehashing of late 90s Korean action films and those who can’t stop enthusing about it. To this reviewer this old dog has no new tricks, but it is worth watching if you are a Korean film fan, not simply because it is slick and smart, but also to make your own mind up.

Expect this film to hit our screens twice – Metrodome (the people who brought us Donnie Darko and Assembly) are releasing this title in the UK and Warner Bros have bought the remake rights.

Joey Leung

Home entertainment

VAMPYR

Vampyr

Format: DVD

Release date: 25 August 2008

Distributor: Eureka Entertainment

Director: Carl Theodor Dreyer

Writer: Christen Jul

Based on: novel by Sheridan Le Fanu

Cast: Julian West, Rena Mandel, Sybille Schmitz, Jan Hieronimko, Maurice Schutz, Albert Bras

Germany/France 1932

75 mins

Most classics of the cinema are great works of dramatic art. Not this one. But it offers a series of inspired original visions that helped shape the supernatural genre and changed the way we spook ourselves.

Director Carl Dreyer doesn’t really try for full coherent enactment of this archetypal vampire tale. When there is some story to be filled in and he doesn’t feel inclined to do it cinematically, he reaches for lengthy expository title cards or even just puts the pages of a creepy old book up on screen for us. The narrative jerks and jumps, with little cumulative tension. The sound is an afterthought and doesn’t contribute much. Oh, and the film isn’t very frightening. But it is a dream, and dreams don’t follow the plot.

As so often in German films of this era (OK, Dreyer was Danish), one marvels at the technical invention of the cinematography. The early interior scenes instil a hallucinatory unease, somewhere between The Cabinet of Dr Caligari and Eraserhead. Dreyer offers closeness where space would be more comfortable, and vice versa. And the oddness of the camera’s angles and movements deny the viewer a sense of a secure viewpoint. The indications that usually allow us to get a grip on a narrative – connection between events, explanation of occurrences, motivation for actions – are withheld. As for the exteriors, Dreyer swathes them in a glowing haze, softening the perspectives and thus our sense of depth and distance, while endowing the figures with a gliding grace of movement. The action is punctuated with shadows and silhouettes that resonate with ominous visual portent – reapers, diggers, dancers. They don’t serve to tell us something, they just prime our minds with symbolic suggestions.

Vampyr is not just a director’s film. There is a central performance like no other from an actor who led one of the most remarkable lives of the century (a life that calls out to be told first by a serious biographer and then by a demented filmmaker). Baron Nicolas de Gunzburg traded in his mundane given name for the exotic screen alias of – ooh! – ‘Julian West’. He then laid a trail of adventure and debauchery from the Old World to the New. But this role must be his great achievement, in a film that he financed himself. His pale elegance and gravity of demeanour lend dignity and conviction in a genre where the mannered easily spills over into the ludicrous. Horror, like comedy, is no joke: it often needs the unhinged, but it more often needs to be played straight. The climax of West’s performance, and Dreyer’s tour de force, is a dream/out-of-body sequence that takes a scary idea and makes it sublime by the imagination, wit, and sheer oddness of its realisation.

How many of us can truly say that we have enough eerie in our lives? Vampyr is a deep well from which we can draw.

Peter Momtchiloff

Home entertainment

THE WALTER HILL COLLECTION

The Long Riders

Format: DVD

Release date: 25 August 2008

Distributor: )ptimum Releasing

Director: Walter Hill

Titles: The Driver, The Warriors, The Long Riders, Southern Comfort, Extreme Prejudice, Johnny Handsome

Cast: Michael Beck, Ryan O’Neal, Isabelle Adjani, Bruce Dern, Keith Carradine, Powers Booth, Nick Nolte, Mickey Rourke, Morgan Freeman, Lance Henriksen

USA 1978-1989

568 mins

Minimalism is the key characteristic of the early films of Walter Hill, as exemplified by his car chase classic The Driver (1978), in which the characters are simply referred to as The Driver, The Detective and The Girl. These films are lean, mean, unpretentious thrillers in which existential characters are energised by street-smart storytelling and expertly staged action sequences. The Driver fuses the cool methodology of Jean-Pierre Melville with the pure pulp of dime store fiction to focus on the professional rivalry between a getaway specialist (Ryan O’Neal) and an obsessive cop (Bruce Dern), both of whom are aided and impeded by an elusive femme fatale (Isabelle Adjani). Hill’s characters exist in the moment, rarely considering consequence, which makes The Driver as ambiguous as it is exciting.

The Warriors (1979) is the socially prescient story of a small-time New York gang that is framed for assassinating Cyrus, the charismatic underworld leader who has been trying to bring a truce to the streets. They attempt to escape the South Bronx, only to be attacked at every turn by gangs with such menacing monikers as The Orphans and The Baseball Furies. Accused of inciting violence upon release, The Warriors is an electrifying excursion into urban subculture, which utilises such locations as Coney Island, Central Park and deserted subway stations to unsettling effect.

The protagonists of Southern Comfort (1981) are also being hunted, but this time our heroes are National Guardsmen, the urban jungle has been replaced by the boggy marshes of a Louisiana swamp, and the antagonists are Cajuns who do not like to be disrespected on their land. Although Southern Comfort can be viewed as a metaphor for the Vietnam War, with American soldiers becoming undermined in an environment that they do not understand territorially or culturally, it is first and foremost a suspenseful action picture that gradually grips through a sustained sense of sweaty atmosphere.

Each of these films is influenced by the pared-down moral universe of the western, and Hill attempted to revive the moribund genre with The Long Riders (1980), an evocative vision of the Old West which offers a sympathetic portrait of the Jesse James gang, with real-life acting siblings cast as the brothers that formed the outlaw posse. Although the pace is leisurely compared to the director’s contemporary thrillers, the film exudes the authenticity which would later distinguish the HBO series Deadwood, which Hill produced.

Extreme Prejudice (1987) and Johnny Handsome (1989) serve as examples of Hill’s late-80s creative decline. The former features Nick Nolte as a Texas Ranger taking on a drugs cartel, while the latter stars Mickey Rourke as a hideously disfigured criminal who is offered a second chance at life following extensive cosmetic surgery. Both are more melodramatic than Hill’s earlier oeuvre, and concede to, rather than challenge, the conventions of action cinema. While these later studio assignments are defined by the time in which they were made, Hill’s early films are visceral genre vehicles that are still ahead of the curb.

John Berra