(aka Atomik Circus – Le retour de James Bataille) Luc Besson created a new school of French film when he made The Professional. In fact, there are times when it seems that France no longer makes any films other than extravagant thrillers with more flashy style than substance. Think Diva, The Fifth Element and Crimson […]
Read more "Atomik Circus [The Return of James Battle] (2004)"It’s amazing how many films came out on VHS and have never been re-released. Which isn’t to say that many — or even most — of them don’t deserve to languish in obscurity. But thanks to the wonders of Youtube, a lot of films that were just a whisper heard here or there, a comment […]
Read more "Futuropolis (1984)"This was David Cronenberg’s first film and it is in many respects a dry run for Scanners. It is also seriously strange and arty. He got the Canadian government to give him a substantial grant to write a novel, but made this film instead. I really don’t know how they reacted, although I’m cynical enough to […]
Read more "Stereo (1969)"The one thing that constantly surprises me is how far some people stray from where they started out. Take Luigi Cozzi, one of those Italian directors from the Eighties who is best remembered for making Starcrash, a totally bonkers Star Wars rip off, and Contamination, a moderately bad Alien copy. When I saw that his first […]
Read more "Tunnel Under the World [Il tunnel sotto il mondo] (1969)"(aka Demon) This one is almost impossible to sum up. This is partly because any attempt is going to carry even the most circumspect summary into spoiler territory. However, it is also because this is a film that starts in one place and then moves into stranger and stranger places which seem to have little […]
Read more "God Told Me To (1976)"It is hard to even begin to write about this one. After all, what we have here is a very strange Art House Science Fiction movie, jam packed with incredible imagery and following a decidedly non-linear course through what seems almost a simple story — if it weren’t so complicated. A man has been sent back in […]
Read more "Cycle (2012)"Film — as an Avant Garde art form? That is essentially what the director, Marcel L’Herbier, is doing here. This film was made at the height of the Paris Avant Garde of the Twenties, with a handful of Marcel’s friends from the world of art providing the mise en scène — including Fernand Leger, René […]
Read more "L’inhumaine [The Inhuman Woman] (1924)"