Dracula's Widow (1988)

DRACULA'S WIDOW  (1988)  ¢
    D: Christopher Coppola
    Sylvia Krystel, Joseph Sommer, 
    Lenny Von Dohlen, Rachel Jones
The count would impale himself on a wooden crucifix in a garlic field in broad daylight if he had to endure this boring vampire movie. Sylvia "Emmanuelle" Krystel plays Mrs. Dracula. She doesn't even take off her clothes.

Sylvia Krystel

(1952-2012)

Screen Test / Take 3

Match the following movie titles with the actors who played the title roles:

  1. "Harold and Maude"
  2. "Pat and Mike"
  3. "Min and Bill"
  4. "Robin and Marian"
  5. "McCabe & Mrs. Miller"
  6. "John and Mary"
  7. "Ma and Pa Kettle"
  8. "Henry & June"
  9. "Bonnie and Clyde"
10. "Benny & Joon"

a. Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway
b. Fred Ward and Uma Thurman
c. Dustin Hoffman and Mia Farrow
d. Aidan Quinn and Mary Stuart Masterson
e. Katharine Hepburn and Spencer Tracy
f. Sean Connery and Audrey Hepburn
g. Bud Cort and Ruth Gordon
h. Warren Beatty and Julie Christie
i. Marie Dressler and Wallace Beery
j. Marjorie Main and Percy Kilbride

Answers:
1-g / 2-e / 3-i / 4-f / 5-h / 6-c / 7-j / 8-b / 9-a / 10-d

The Saddest Music In the World (2003)

THE SADDEST MUSIC IN THE WORLD  (2003)
    D: Guy Maddin                                                ¢ ¢ ¢ 1/2
    Isabella Rossellini, Mark McKinney, Maria de Medeiros
When a Winnipeg beer baroness launches a contest to determine which country produces the saddest music, musicians from around the world come together to compete. This looks like it was shot inside a snow globe. (It was actually filmed in a freezing warehouse: Both the snow and the steam coming from the actors' mouths are real.) Taking his visual cues from silents and early talkies, Maddin's both a visionary and a throwback. Using old forms to challenge the conventions that made those forms obsolete, he creates a kind of soft-focus dreamworld in which art and artifice hook up, knock back a few pints, and stumble arm-in-arm out into the snow.

The Conversation (1974)

THE CONVERSATION  (1974)  ¢ ¢ ¢ ¢

    D: Francis Ford Coppola

    Gene Hackman, John Cazale, Allen Garfield,

    Frederic Forrest, Cindy Williams, Teri Garr,

    Michael Higgins, Elizabeth MacRae, Harrison Ford

Gene Hackman plays Harry Caul, a professional eavesdropper who becomes obsessed with a conversation he's recorded that could be a clue to a murder. A tense, paranoid variation on "Blow-Up", directed by Coppola at his peak, between the first and second "Godfather" pictures. Hackman looks so ordinary in this, he's practically invisible. A balding, middle-aged man in glasses and a dime-store raincoat, Harry's the last guy you'd ever pick out in a crowd. That's the idea, of course, and it's hard to remember another case of an actor playing a character so nondescript, and making it so compelling.

Lustful Addiction (2002)

LUSTFUL ADDICTION  (2002)  ¢ 1/2
    D: Misty Mundae
    Ruby LaRocca, Misty Mundae,
    Darian Caine, T. Oilet
Straight-to-video goddess Misty Mundae wrote and directed this loose remake of Nick Phillips' 1969 grindhouse flick, in which characters do drugs, have sex and come to a real bad end. True to Seduction Cinema's infallible money-making formula, the production values are cheap and most of the groping is between women, the centerpiece being a long (some would say endless) scene in which Misty and Ruby LaRocca fondle each other between hits of coke and ecstasy while lounging around in their strip-joint underwear. The drug use, like the sex, appears to be simulated.

Lustful Addiction (1969)

LUSTFUL ADDICTION  (1969)  ¢ ¢
    D: Nick Phillips
    Justine D'Or
Softcore smut aimed at the 42nd Street raincoat trade, about a pretty girl who meets a real nice guy but can't stay away from the pusher man. A grindhouse art film in black and white, with no dialogue and a lot of jangly sitar music on the soundtrack. The voiceover narration is in verse, and the shots of people shooting up and nodding off are intercut with negative footage of monkeys. A video remake by Misty Mundae came out in 2002.

Meek's Cutoff (2011)

MEEK'S CUTOFF  (2011)  ¢ ¢ ¢ ¢
    D: Kelly Reichardt
    Michelle Williams, Bruce Greenwood, Will Patton,
    Shirley Henderson, Paul Dano, Zoe Kazan, Neal Huff
This might be the first wagon-train movie in 90 years, or maybe ever, that does nothing to minimize or romanticize the harshness of the journey west. It's about a handful of settlers trying to make it across the desert of Eastern Oregon in 1845. There are some recognizable faces among them, but nobody in this movie looks like a movie star. They look like the characters they're playing: hot, grimy, exhausted, miserable, desperate and scared. Plus, they're lost and they're running out of water, and it's not clear that the guide they've hired to get them through the mountains knows where the hell he's going. Then they kidnap an Indian, hoping he can lead them across, or at least to the next water hole, but it's not clear where he's taking them, either. The film leaves you with a real appreciation for the insane bravery of those who took the wagons across the prairie (and for the agonizing amount of time it took to load a black-powder gun). The western landscape has never looked more desolate or spectacular, and Reichardt uses a lot of existing light. You don't always see real well, but you see what the settlers see, and you hear what they hear, sometimes just the endlessly repetitive sound of a creaking wheel, or the muffled words of a quiet conversation 50 feet away. There's no conventional story arc. You could question whether the picture even has a beginning or an end. It's more like you're with these people, driving the oxen or gathering fire wood, knitting or kneading bread, stealing a rare moment along the way to read, or sing, or laugh, or pray, and then moving on again, heading west, trudging forever across the plain.