Tag Archives: stalker

Star 80 Star 80 4 star

March 3rd, 2010 by surlaroute

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This has been on my “to watch” list for probably nearly a decade now, since I first came across Bob Fosse’s All That Jazz and Lenny, both of which instantly added him to my list of favourite directors despite his very short resume (in addition to these, there’s only Sweet Charity and Cabaret). It’s amazing in all that time of procrastinating that I never came across any plot info about the movie, and I’m glad… I came to this movie knowing very little about the real life story it’s based on – only that it had something to do with a Playboy model – and as such I got as much out of its shocking turns as it’s possible to get, so I recommend you do likewise and stop reading if you plan on seeing it any time soon, though I won’t get into too much detail (but don’t look at the tags).

This movie reminded me a lot of two other movies I’ve seen in the past couple of years: Lipstick (which shared actress Mariel Hemingway) and Looking for Mr. Goodbar, with a small (less rollercoaster-ish) dash of Paul Thomas Anderson’s Boogie Nights. I wouldn’t say it’s quite as good as any of these, nor at least three of Fosse’s other works (I’ve not yet seen Sweet Charity, though I hear it’s a pretty straight 60s musical so I doubt it’ll wow me), it’s a particularly slow, procedural build to an electrifying finale that left me emotionally drained. It’s certainly worth a look if you’re into such raw Seventies/Early-80s grit.

Duel [1971] Duel [1971] 4 star

February 19th, 2008 by surlaroute

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I’m sure I’d seen parts of this before – though perhaps it’s that the imagery is just so practically iconic, the red car and the dirty truck, that you see a couple of stills and feel the whole thing. There were certainly parts I hadn’t seen, however; like the whole inner monologue of the roadside diner, such an amazing scene right there. This is a very pared down version of Spielberg than we’ve become used to; you can feel the more action-oriented stuff like Indiana Jones, but more than anything it’s Jaws that comes to mind – you could almost say Jaws is “Duel with a shark” (the ending in particular, I’d love to do a side-by-side comparison of the whole flaming car going into the truck etc with the destruction of the shark; Dennis Weaver’s almost pitiful celebration dance atop the cliff is just beautiful).

There are a lot of movies like this, from The Vanishing to The Hitcher to Breakdown and they pretty much always work, it’s almost as reliable a startpoint for a movie as a conman story (Gone and the like notwithstanding, lol :P ). This is really no exception: a tight, claustrophobic, beautifully designed chase that really leaves no doubt in your mind about the heights Spielberg would soar to. Apparently there’s a 90 minute cut; but hey, the original 75 minute TV cut worked fine for me this time, and at that length, really, I should be ashamed as a film fan for taking so long to give it my attention.