In Pieter Bruegel’s painting, “Landscape with the Fall of Icarus,” the fall of the god, Icarus, passes unnoticed on earth. The farmers continue to work the land and the boats sail on. As William Carlos Williams later wrote in his poem of the same name, “a once mighty god becomes a little splash quite unnoticed.” In Chris Sullivan’s version, Icarus becomes Ray, an aging priest whose congregation is dwindling as fast as his sanity. As Ray’s condition deteriorates, society fails to notice or care.
Tag: USA
While working on a documentary, Michel Negroponte encounters a homeless woman in Central Park who claims to be Robert Ryan’s daughter. What more, the woman, Maggie, says she’s the god Jupiter’s wife and periodically receives radio transmissions from him. Intrigued, Negroponte abandons his old project and starts interviewing Maggie. The result, after two years, is a film that attempts to separate fact from fiction and reconstruct the fascinating real life of this endearingly eccentric woman.
10-year-old Kathy prefers pigtails to curls and runs away for the day to avoid a hair appointment. While she’s off having adventures with her best pal Jeeter, her parents clash over how to handle the situation. Kathy’s mother worries that her daughter doesn’t “fit in” while her father believes she’s “just an individual” and should be allowed to grow up at her own pace. At the end of the day, Kathy must return home to face the inevitable.
Over an eight-year period in the 1970s, Leo Hurwitz made this film tribute to his deceased wife and colleague, the film editor and director Peggy Lawson. His most personal work and his last major production, Hurwitz’s film is at once epic and lyrical; a portrait of an individual and chronicle of the times; an ode to the spirit of artistic collaboration and a testament to political idealism. The film contains beautiful original material plus documentary footage and reconstructions — excerpts from a number of Hurwitz’s films; the voices of Paul Robeson, Kaiulani Lee and Alfred Drake; and music that ranges from Bach to Marc Blitzstein.
Struggling hippie independent filmmaker Mick gets his big break after he finds out that his girlfriend Marlene’s father Burt is a movie producer. Unbeknown to Mick, Burt only specializes in porno pictures. Mick cranks out a cruddy science fiction stinker in three days for Burt, who demands countless changes and has a hard time figuring out how to distribute Mick’s lousy movie.
Former music-video director Michael H. Shamberg debut film is an experimental drama about a woman who comes to terms with painful childhood memories. Orlando is an expatriate American sports journalist living in Paris. She is also slowly recovering from childhood sexual abuse from her father and an incestuous relationship with her late brother. As she wanders the streets on a rainy evening, she sullenly ruminates over her memories. Both Kristin Scott Thomas and Christina Ricci play small parts in this film, while legendary filmmaker Chris Marker provides computer graphics.
Gizmo! is an irresistible collection of newsreel footage chronicling the inventive spirit in America. We are treated to some of the strangest inventions ever concocted by man, as well as a few forgotten contraptions that seem to make a great deal of sense. Naturally, filmmaker Howard Smith does not let slip the opportunity of showing the inventors at their most foolish, so once again those ubiquitous shots of collapsing one-man airplanes and malfunctioning jet-powered backpacks are trotted out. Gizmo! is a wonderful way to spend 77 minutes, as well as an ideal fund-raiser for your local PBS “pledge week”.
In this gay classic from acclaimed filmmaker Ira Sachs, 18-year-old Lincoln Bloom leads a relatively straight teenage life, but finds himself drawn to the anonymous sexual encounters of local gay bars and video arcades. He soon meets Minh, a Vietnamese immigrant, and embarks with him on a trip down the river, where their doomed relationship hits a dramatic turning point.