Far Out Films From The Seventies: Disco Godfather

This Article Originally Appeared Here At Moon In The Gutter.


There are very few things in this world that give me more pleasure than the opening ten minutes of 1980's DISCO GODFATHER. I must admit to being a huge Rudy Ray Moore fan and my DOLEMITE box set is never too far away from my dvd player. I have noticed though, while I have watched all of the films multiple times, I often just return to particular sequences. From the, 'dance cracker dance' madness of the first film to the 'slow motion jump' in THE HUMAN TORNADO to the shot of Rudy Ray Moore dancing down the street with the Devil's cane in PETEY WHEATSTRAW, these films continually give me more sheer delight than most 'great' films coould ever hope to.
As awesome as any of those scenes are though none come even close to matching the joy that the opening shots of DISCO GODFATHER give me. A certain J. Robert Wagoner is credited as the director of DISCO GODFATHER but I have always suspected that Rudy Ray Moore himself probably had more to do with the production of the film than anyone else. A glance over at the IMDB listing for Wagoner shows DISCO GODFATHER as the only film he was ever attached to.
So onto the opening shot...As the great DISCO GODFATHER theme comes up and the opening credits literally burst out of the screen at us, we are treated to our first shots of the Blueberry Hill nightclub. People are dancing and having the kind of grand time that only 1979 could bring, strobe lights are flashing, drinks are being poured, cigarettes are being smoked and that great theme keeps pounding. People soon clear the dance floor though as the DJ announces the arrival of the one and only...you guessed it, The Disco Godfather!!! Just before we see the great man our propulsive theme takes on some vocals and the line "He's the Godfather of the disco" begins repeating like some sort of life altering mantra and then there he is in all of his blue sequined jump suited glory. Everything I love about Rudy Ray Moore comes out in this moment...with a huge smile on his face, shaking hips, those great head swivels and the kind of outfit that only Dolemite himself could get away with. The crowd applauds him and Rudy gets down on the dance floor. Of course Rudy Ray Moore's dance moves are a bit like his karate chops, one gets the impression that this guy is to cool to expel too much energy and slowness is one of his greatest weapons. Soon Rudy is at the head of the room commanding everybody to, "Put your weight on it" and the crowd goes crazy and the dancing begins again. These opening shots of Rudy have gotten me through many rough times and they remain a sure fire cure for even the toughest depressions.

DISCO GODFATHER is certainly very different from the three Dolemite films that proceeded it. The first three were all hard R's, actually if memory serves I believe the first DOLEMITE was actually an X, filled with as much violence, language and nudity that they could squeeze into them. DISCO GODFATHER is PG and I think that a lot of fans have ignored the film due to this, they view it a bit as Rudy going soft and I suppose in a way that is true...but for all of its camp value, cheap production and sheer cheesiness there is something extremely sincere about DISCO GODFATHER.
The plot of DISCO GODFATHER centers on nightclub owner, and former cop, Tucker Williams and his battle to get PCP off the streets and out of the hands of his cities kids. Played by Rudy, Tucker is a hard hitting, take no prisoner, dancing and crime stopping machine. Joining him is the lovely and always great to see Carol Speed, seen here in one of her last film roles. Returning from the first three Dolemite adventures are Jimmy Lynch, Jerry Jones and of course the unstoppable Lady Reed.
Tucker Williams thinks all is fine in the world until his hot shot basketball playing nephew has a total meltdown in his nightclub one evening and ends up in a mental hospital. As the ambulance is carrying his nephew away, Tucker delivers the legendary, "Doctor, what has he had?" line and it is explained that the dreaded angel dust has infested the town. "Haven't you heard Godfather, our kids are dying." is the the thought that really fires Tucker up and soon he is paying a visit to his old buddies at the police station to let them know he is going to single handily take care of the situation.

As I said there is something really sincere in Rudy Ray's performance in this film. No one would ever call the great Dolemite one of the world's best actors but throughout DISCO GODFATHER one really gets the feeling that this guy really means every word he is saying.
I won't give away any more of the film as I really just wanted to celebrate the opening sequence but it's a fun film and fans of seventies trash cinema and the blaxploitation genre should absolutely give it a look. I miss the kind of kinetic, devil many care attitude these films had. One rarely gets the excited feeling of , "Look, I can make my own movie and have a great time doing it" anymore but all of the DOLEMITE films, including the often overlooked DISCO GODFATHER, possess that.

Far Out Films From The Seventies: Eric Rohmer's Claire's Knee

This article originally appeared here at Moon In The Gutter to mark the passing of the great Jean-Claude Brialy.


After a decade of working with pretty much every important French New Wave director on the scene, Jean-Claude Brialy started the 1970's out with a film for a director he once described as 'the pope' of the new wave, Eric Rohmer. Rohmer initially offered Brialy the lead in his fifth Moral Tale, LE GENOU DE CLAIRE (CLAIRE'S KNEE) in 1968 and Brialy accepted instantaneously.
Looking over his unbelievable filmography I was struck by just how many favorites of mine Jean-Claude appeared in. I could start an entire new blog just dedicated to his best work so I knew really attempting to cover too many of them wasn't feasible. I wanted to write on one that I thought stood out, at least to me, as the best of the many great films Brialy made.
One aspect of Eric Rohmer's genius that isn't pointed out enough is his ability to cast just the right actor in the right role, and it his timing with these roles that is so uncanny. Think of Francoise Fabien in MY NIGHT AT MAUDS, no other actress could have inhabited that role better than her and yet just a year or two earlier or later in her career and she might have felt out of place in it. Throughout Rohmer's career he has had this ability of giving roles to people in that perfect instance in their lives and this was never more than true than the casting of Jean-Claude Brialy as Jerome in CLAIRE'S KNEE.

The first thing that should be noted about Jean-Claude as Jerome is his striking appearance. Fully bearded and heavier than he had ever been, he almost looks like a completely different person from the actor everyone fell in love with in the sixties. Jerome, over-confident and almost cold, could have been a really unlikable character with any other actor playing him. But there is something in Brialy's eyes in this film that is quite remarkable. There is a real sadness there, an almost weariness behind the cocky mask he wears that suggests he is someone who knows that the one thing he can't conquer, aging, is in fact conquering him.
Jerome is engaged and on his last holiday as a bachelor. He talks of women now leaving him cold, with his fiancee an exception. The relationship is obviously a passionless one and Jerome has an invisible fortress around him of indifference. He meets up with an old friend, a writer named Aurora, who is amused by him. She introduces him to the teenage Laura in order to convince him that he can still feel a certain fire but Jerome feels well above it all and maintains his coldness...until he meets Laura's older sister Claire. Claire, and specifically her knee, reminds him of something from his youth. This something that she reminds him of suddenly starts to remove the armor that has weighed him down for so long and the cracks in his cool demeanor start to show.

I can't think of too many performances that portray approaching middle age and the inevitable disappointments life gives better than Jean-Claude Brialy in CLAIRE'S KNEE. Brialy is able to make Jerome among the most human characters in screen history. He is smug yet defeated, and projects an outward confidence while a vulnerable little child sits deep within him. Brialy's Jerome is a mirror for our failings and yet a perfect reminder that the human spirit doesn't have to grow old with the body.
Rohmer directs the film with his usual subtle flair and his legendary gift for dialogue is at it's sharpest here. Few writers have ever been able to accurately get the way people actually talk, but somehow the great Rohmer always manages it. Brialy would say that Rohmer invited him to change the script to his liking and Brialy admitted that he wouldn't dare change even a comma.

Last year Criterion gave film lovers a major gift with their Eric Rohmer Moral Tales box set. Featuring a generous supply of extras and exquisite transfers, CLAIRE'S KNEE with it's sun drenched Nestor Almendros photographer benefited greatly and the disc is an ideal way to watch this beautiful film.

Brialy and Rohmer would never work together again. I suspect they both knew that they couldn't top perfection. CLAIRE'S KNEE and Jean-Claude Brialy's performance are among the best French cinema has to offer.

Far Out Films Of The Seventies: Lipstick

Released in the spring of 1976 to near universal disdain and almost killing off the film career of Margaux Hemingway before it even had a chance to truly begin, Lamont Johnson’s LIPSTICK remains one of the best, if most under-appreciated, revenge flicks of the seventies. An exhilaratingly seedy film propelled by Johnson’s stylish direction, Hemingway’s electric screen presence and an incredibly off kilter score by legendary French musician Michel Polnareff.
Lamont Johnson is probably best known as a television director for such series as The Twilight Zone but a quick glance over his filmography will show some real surprises, like the bone-chilling Patti Duke thriller YOU’LL LIKE MY MOTHER (1972) and the winning Robby Benson-Annette O’Toole romance ONE ON ONE (1977). Johnson lent a sure hand to all of his projects (his television film MY SWEET CHARLIE (1970), also starring Patti Duke, is one of the real lost treasures of the period) and his work on LIPSTICK is no different as it is an exceedingly well-directed and confident film.

LIPSTICK was the brainchild of mega big time producers Dino De Laurentiis and Freddie Fields. It began to take shape in the mid seventies and it was first offered to award winning British director Michael Winner in 1974. Winner, no stranger to revenge thrillers, as he had just come off the smash hit DEATH WISH with Charles Bronson, turned down the project and it ended up with Johnson and screenwriter David Rayfiel. Rayfiel had spent much of his career touching up quality screenplays like JEREMIAH JOHNSON (1972), THE WAY WE WERE WERE (1973) and THREE DAYS OF THE CONDOR (1974) and it is a pity that he didn’t have some back up on LIPSTICK as his formulaic script is easily the weakest thing about it. The much-maligned Margaux Hemingway is actually very good in the film when she is asked to react and express emotion, but Rayfiel’s wooden dialogue consistently lets the inexperienced actress down.

LIPSTICK marks the first feature film by Fields where he is granted sole production credited. De Laurentiis is listed as executive producer and LIPSTICK does indeed feel more like a Freddie Fields production than one of Dino’s works as it shares much in common stylistically with Fields later monster hit, Paul Schrader’s AMERICAN GIGOLO (1980). It can be argued that the look and feel of LIPSTICK had more of an effect on American cinema in the early eighties than the several uber-hits of the period that get most of the credit.
Fields got the idea to fill the role of the lead in the film, a super-model named Chris McCormick, with an actual big time model of the period early on in the film’s planning stages. After juggling around a few possibilities with De Laurentiis the named that kept popping up was a young model who was quickly becoming one of the most in demand and influential of the period.

Margaux Hemingway was born in Portland, Oregon in the winter of 1954. She grew up on her father Jack’s farm in Ketchum, Idaho and was scarred at the age of seven with the news that her legendary Grandfather, literary giant Ernest Hemingway, had killed himself with a shotgun blast to the head. Her Grandfather’s legend and tragic death would haunt the young Hemingway for the rest of her life as she consistently battled her own personal demons until her untimely demise in 1996.
In the mind seventies though, tragedy seemed very far away from Margaux as she made huge headlines by being the first model to ever get a million dollar contract, for the Faberge fragrance 'Babe'. The just past twenty year old Hemingway’s face was every where and she can lay legitimate claim to being one of the first genuine ‘super-models’ in history and she would influence everyone who followed from Gia Carangi to Adriana Lima.
Movies seemed a logical step for Margaux and she accepted Fields offer to star in the very difficult role of a McCormick, a model very much like herself who is brutally raped by an assailant and then the judicial system before brandishing her own form of justice on them both. In hindsight it is easy to see that the part was too much for a first time actress with zero experience, but everyone at the time thought LIPSTICK would be a major hit and Margaux would become one of the key stars of the late seventies.
Joining Margaux in the cast were Chris Sarandon as the twisted music teacher who rapes McCormick and Anne Bancroft as the prosecutor who signs on to her case. Both Sarandon and Bancroft were coming off recent Oscar nominations and the two were really in peak form when they filmed LIPSTICK, with Sarandon’s performance proving to be one of the most chilling of the period. Other cast members included future television star Perry King, and famed top fashion photographer Francesco Scavullo playing, appropriately enough, a photographer named Francesco. His rather astounding work as a photographer can be seen throughout the film in the form of some of the most unforgettable images of Margaux ever shot.
The key role in the film though is undoubtedly that of Chris’ younger sister Kathy, which would turn out to be the debut role for Margaux’s younger sister Mariel. Margaux herself suggested the fifteen-year Mariel to Fields and it would begin one of the most notable film careers of the late seventies and early eighties. Whereas Margaux seemed to having trouble shifting into her new role as an actress, the younger Mariel took to it immediately and she would end up getting the films one Golden Globe nomination as best supporting actress.

The paint by numbers storyline of rape and revenge in LIPSTICK is radically simple. What makes the film special is how it teeters between being a stylish and serious attempt to look at the legal consequences of rape in this country and a down and dirty exploitation thriller. Considering that the film does drag in the middle a bit during the legal proceedings, it does finally work better as a stylized big budget thriller as there are few things more exciting in a seventies film than seeing Margaux Hemingway decked out in an unbelievably cool red dress yielding a shotgun during the film’s electric and unforgettable climax.
The more campy and exploitative elements aside, LIPSTICK does in fact make some good points along the way about the legal system and the way rape was perceived in this country in 1976 and to a certain extent today. One of the film's most telling moments is indeed that only 1 out of every 5 rapes is reported and only two out of every 100 prosecuted rapists serve time. Now I am sure those numbers, at least I hope, have changed in today's society but the film does a good job in alering viewers to some disturbing facts.
The film received a lot of criticism at the time for the prolonged rape sequence between Sarandon and the older Hemingway. It is curious to me that Gaspar Noe’s IRREVERSABLE was attacked for the same reason several years back as the two films present rape as a very violent and ugly act. There isn’t anything erotic about the sequence in LIPSTICK; it is an extremely ugly scene about the ugliest of crimes. I have a lot more trouble with films that don’t show how horrifying the act is and LIPSTICK has always been unfairly abused over what is actually an extremely effective and well-handled sequence. Hemingway is particularly good here with the trauma and fear she is experiencing seeming totally real.
The film’s not perfect by a long shot. Several scenes just don’t play at all, especially a couple involving the usually reliable Bancroft, who comes off too over the top throughout the film. When it does work though, it does so splendidly and LIPSTICK is finally a hard film to shake.
Two things that help the film immensely are the photography and music. Oscar nominated director of photographer Bill Butler should be a household name with works ranging from Coppola’s THE CONVERSATION (1974) to Stallone’s ROCKY 2 (1978) on his resume and he gives LIPSTICK a sexy dripping exotic sheen that is hard to look away from. It’s an ultra slick and masterfully shot production that is among the best looking of the period.
Even better is the strange and powerful score by legendary French composer and musician Polnareff. Always under the radar in this country, Polnareff is one of the major figures in French music and his LIPSTICK soundtrack is one of his greatest creations, a weird mix of experimental electronica and dance that propels the film to greatness even when the script and certain scenes fall totally flat. The out of print album is one of the best soundtracks of the seventies.

Finally, one can help but watch LIPSTICK with some sincere melancholy in knowing what happened to Margaux Hemingway. The critical community really took their time in burying someone who might have turned into a talented actress. Instead of labeling her as awful as many of them did, they should have passed it off to her obvious inexperience and let up a bit. It would take her three years to make another feature, Antonio Margheriti’s KILLER FISH (1979), and she would only sporadically work in mostly straight to video productions through the rest of her short life. There are some really chilling moments in LIPSTICK where one can recognize some real talent in the older and doomed Hemingway. It is tragic it was never allowed to be tapped into again.

Mariel would quickly become one of the major young actresses of the late seventies after LIPSTICK and would snag a well-deserved Oscar nomination just a few years later with Woody Allen’s MANHATTAN in 1979. She would call LIPSTICK a “fascinating experience” in her autobiography but noted that when it was released, “people said” she was “ the star, while Margaux’s acting was hurtfully panned” and that this “intensified her self destructive behavior and the distance” between them “began to take on adult dimensions.”
LIPSTICK collapsed at the box office almost immediately and was subjected to heavy cuts throughout Europe when it premiered a year or so later there. It appeared on Video in the eighties and then slipped out of print for more than a decade before Paramount surprisingly brought it back on a bare bones DVD a few years ago. Not even containing a trailer, this DVD at least features a sharp widescreen transfer and is still readily available for anyone interested.

Far Out Films From The Seventies: The Pyjama Girl Case

This article originally appeared here at Moon In The Gutter.


Flavio Mogherini started out his career in the late 40's as a production designer for numerous Italian films. He continued his career through the fifties and sixties as a production designer on many other works as well as an art and set director and costume designer.
Throughout the early days of his career he worked with many notable directors including Pasolini, Campanile, and Mario Bava. He turned to writing and directing in 1972 at the age of fifty with ANCHE SE VOLESSI LAVORARE, CHE FACCIO, which featured Barbara Bouchet. He had a hit with the Marcello Mastroianni 1976 film LUNATICS AND LOVERS and would direct a handful of films after this before passing away at the age of 72 in 1994. Along with his fine work as an art director with some of Italian cinema's finest directors, Mogherini will probably be remembered mostly for his bizarre and striking 1977 thriller, THE PYJAMA GIRL CASE or THE CASE OF THE GIRL IN THE YELLOW PYJAMAS.

Yellow is a key word in discussing this film for two reasons. The color yellow plays a huge role in as it clues in the audience early on that this seemingly conventional film is anything but, as this traditional murder and police investigation story is actually one of the most clever non-linear art films of the seventies. Yellow is also the color often associated with the Italian Giallo, which this film is often grouped into. Whether or not it should be labeled a giallo is up to the viewer as it does have elements of the genre but more often than not it is completely uncharacteristic of it.
THE PYJAMA GIRL CASE was inspired loosely by a real life 1934 murder of Linda Agostini, whose only identifiable feature were her silk pyjamas. Mogherini's film takes this tragic true event and uses it as a spring board for one of seventies cinema's oddest creations.

Working from his own script, Mogherini fashions two seemingly non connected stories following the haunting opening sequence where the badly burned body of a female is discovered by a child on a beach. One story is of Police Inspector Thompson, played by the amazing Ray Milland, who is investigating the mysterious murder. The other story tells of a lonely young woman, played by the underrated Dalila Di Lazzaro, who is going through a series of frustrating and increasingly empty love affairs. Through the first forth of the film the audience follows the two stories along until, through a series of very subtle clues, we realize that the girl is actually the murder victim from the beginning of the film, and Mogherini has been presenting the audience with a most clever twist on the traditional use of the flashback.
I have talked to a few people who have seen this film and some don't like that Mogherini is letting her back story play out at the same time we are seeing the investigation into her death, but to me it gives the film an incredible emotional pull that simply isn't in most thrillers from this period. Had Mogherini told the film chronologically, or used a traditional flashback technique, the film would lose much of its power. Many audience members don't like even the suggestion that they are in any way being manipulated and tricked but Mogherini's carefully crafted film has a reason for its startling structure, Lazzaro's life IS Milland's investigation. More than searching for a murderer, Milland is looking to give this unknown victim her identity back.
Academy Award winner Milland was nearing the end of his big screen career with THE PYJAMA GIRL CASE, and he would pass away just a decade later with an impressive and varied career under his belt. His role as the aging and undermined Inspector in Mogherini's film is among his most undervalued performances. It is a work of great empathy and at times sly comic moments; how seriously Milland might have taken this role I don't know but he plays it out beautifully. It is interesting to note similarities between this role and Max Von Sydow's character in Dario Argento's recent SLEEPLESS, another aging past his prime inspector seemingly left on his own to solve a case.
The cast also includes Mel Ferrer as Lazzaro's oldest and richest lover, and he is great at presenting a slightly seedy character that we know will abandon her, like everyone else in her life seems to. Michele Placido and Howard Ross also turn in fine performances as men in Lazzaro's increasingly out of control love life.

Lazzaro was an Italian fashion model in the late sixties who had made a few films before her memorable work in Paul Morrissey's FLESH FOR FRANKENSTEIN. Often overlooked as one of the great beauties of the seventies Lazzarao turns in her finest work as an actress in Mogherini's film as the his title character. She is really wonderful in the film at conveying a sense of loss and lonliness in this character. She actually plays her final moments in the film so well that I find thes scenes to be among the hardest to watch in any Italian genre film. Lazzaro made many films before and after PYJAMA GIRL CASE but it remains her greatest and most complex role.
Key among the film's assets is the score by Riz Ortolani featuring songs by Amanda Lear. One of the most unique of all of Ortolani's work that at times sounds like a cross between Kraftwerk and Throbbing Gristle, it remains a dividing point to fans of the great Ortolani. The soundtrack album is one of my favorites of the seventies but many people can't tolerate it's odd swings of electronica and sweeping orchestrations. Lear's work on the title track and LOOK AT HER DANCING are equally mesmerizing and play in the film incredibly well.

I first heard about Mogherini's film from Craig Ledbetter's special Giallo European Trash Cinema issue in the mid 90s. Ledbetter's rave review of the film caused me to seek out the only uncut version available at the time in the form of a poor quality full screen Greek vhs. The film was released in a better version by Redemption in England in the late 90s but it was hampered by a poor muffled soundtrack. THE PYJAMA GIRL CASE finally received a definitive presentation a couple of years ago through William Lustig's Blue Underground and this is the version to seek out. Featuring a beautiful widescreen uncut transfer and an interesting documentary on the true life case, this disc is a beauty. It would have been nice to have some additional supplemental material related directly to the film but still the disc is the best presentation the film has ever had.
THE PYJAMA GIRL CASE seems to polarize Italian film buffs. People seem to absolutely love it or despise it. The unconventional narrative of the film bother some people and others seemed turned off by just how untypical it is for a Giallo, if it can really be labeled that at all. Once about 8 years ago I traded a copy with someone for another rare film only to have him label the film misogynistic and confusing. I have read the misogynistic claim before but just don't buy into it. Mogherini makes the Lazzaro character extremely sympathetic and presents her section of the film from her viewpoint, the twisted and cruel characteristics of the male characters in this film should not be mistaken for Mogherini.

I highly recommend THE PYJAMA GIRL CASE for Italian film lovers as well as more adventurous film fans in general. It is a demanding film that asks much more than your average genre picture. The Blue Underground dvd is still available and can usually be found for around fifteen dollars. The incredible soundtrack has unfortunately never been given a cd release and original vinyl copies are hard to come by. It has been posted as a free download on several blogs in the past year and a simple search will bring its strange and numerous treasures to your ears.
Giallo, European Art Film or both? Whatever label you want to put on it Flavio Mogherini's searing PYJAMA GIRL CASE is unlike any other Italian genre film of the seventies, and that fact alone makes it absolutely essential.

Far Out Films From The Seventies: Eyes Of Laura Mars

Starting out life as an early story from legendary director John Carpenter entitled Eyes, Irvin Kershner’s Eyes Of Laura Mars remains one of the slickest and most effective American thrillers of the late seventies. Bolstered by an intense lead performance by Faye Dunaway and some very memorable photography by Helmut Newton, Eyes Of Laura Mars was a fairly big hit back in 1978 but is often overlooked as one of the more memorable films of the period.
Carpenter had come up with the idea for Eyes, about a controversial fashion photographer who can psychically see through the eyes of killer while he is murdering her friends and coworkers, when he was working on spec scripts in the early and mid seventies. After the mammoth success of Halloween, producer Jon Peters bought Carpenter’s story for Columbia Pictures and brought the famed director on board to work on his first major studio film...as its screenwriter.
Carpenter did indeed delver a version of Eyes Of Laura Mars but Columbia wasn’t totally compelled by it so they brought in David Zelag Goodman in to touch it up. The Academy award nominated Goodman is best known for his work on Sam Peckinpah’s Straw Dogs (1971) and the Sci-fi classic Logan’s Run (1976) and his work on Eyes Of Laura Mars remains a point of contention among fans of the film.
Peter’s and Columbia had originally envisioned Eyes as a vehicle for mega-star Barbra Streisand who was fresh off fan favorite A Star Is Born (1976). That idea fell through, although Streisand would end up playing a rather pivotal role in Eyes Of Laura Mars, and Faye Dunaway was hired on instead.

Dunaway, at the time, was rightly considered one of the greatest actresses in Hollywood. She had just had the one-two knock out punch of Roman Polanski’s Chinatown (175) and Sidney Lumet’s Network (1976) and had in fact just won the Academay award for the latter production. Dunaway, nearing forty when she made Eyes Of Laura Mars, was at her absolute height and as Mars she gives one of her great performances, even though it too has its critics.
Future Empire Strikes Back (1982) director Irvin Kershner is often undervalued and Eyes Of Laura Mars is definitely one of his more notable achievements. Kershner got his start in the fifties with such big screen productions like Stakeout On Dope Street (1958) and several popular television productions. This alternating between TV and film would continue throughout the sixties for Kershner where along the way he would garner a few Emmy nominations for his work on the small screen.
Kershner’s most popular film work leading up to Eyes Of Laura Mars were several off the wall dark comedies including A Fine Madness (1966), The Flim-Flam Man (1967) and Up The Sandbox (1972). Sandbox would star Streisand herself in one of her wackiest roles which makes the idea of her in Mars even more intriguing. After the terrific S*P*Y*S in 1974 and the Richard Harris vehicle The Return Of A Man Called Horse (1976), Columbia and Peters approached Kershner with the idea of doing Eyes, a film which would turn out to be his first near all out thriller, and he accepted fairly quickly.
Kershner’s work in Eyes Of Laura Mars is one of its biggest assets. Adapt at building a real sense of dread in the film’s more eerie moments, Kershner also lends his excellent comic hand in the film’s lighter and more human points. His work throughout the film lends it a most distinctive air, almost like a glossy big studio American Giallo. It has that same seductive blood soaked feel about it, something very few American thrillers have ever achieved.
Joining Kershner behind the scenes are Cinematographer Victor J. Kemper, who I just recently wrote about in my look at Arthur Hiller’s The Hospital (1972) and designers Gene Callahan (Art) and Robert Gundlach (Production). Gundlach had just come off a heavy duty job as art director on Robert Guillerman’s King Kong remake in 76 and fittingly Eyes Of Laura Mars resembles the second half of that ambitious and undervalued film perhaps more than any other.

Since Eyes Of Laura Mars is a film set in the fashion world a look at the costume design of the film is warrented and famed designer Theoni V. Aldredge definitely comes through big time with Kershner’s film. Everyone in the film is decked out in some of the most memorable outfits of the period with special mention going to the absolute gorgeous and sexy dresses Aldredge gave Dunaway. It’s stirring work from the multiple Tony and Oscar winning designer and it is a shame that the Academy didn’t at least honor her with a nomination for her work on Eyes Of Laura Mars. She did win a well deserved Saturn Award for the film though.
Legendary and controversial photographer Helmut Newton was hired on by Columbia to shoot the pictures of Laura Mars and his work in the film unforgettable, with his violent and sexy fetishistic photos connecting the film even more to the works by Italian maestros like Sergio Martino and especially Dario Argento. Some of the more striking photos do indeed look like they could be stills from some of the more provocative Italian productions from the early seventies. Eyes Of Laura Mars would mark the first, and unfortunately, final time Newton would lend his unmistakable eye to a film, a fact that alone makes Eyes Of Laura Mars and important work.

Moving along at a lightning pace, thanks to the quick cutting styles of Spielberg editor Michael Kahn, and scored expertly by Artie Kane, Eyes Of Laura Mars is at the very least one of the most entertaining American films of the late seventies. It is also one of the most interesting, perhaps even more so today as our culture has become so saturated by the type of violent and sexual images the film is dealing with. One can see the influence of Newton’s photography everywhere now, from advertisements to film to video, and the questions the film raises about why we are so attracted to such images remains a valuable one.
Joining the rather breathtaking Dunaway is future Oscar winner Tommy Lee Jones, who was just on the brink of stardom here. As the police detective Mars falls for, Jones is very sharp, handsome and justifiably intense. One reason the film’s payoff is so good is due to the amount of humanity and natural charisma that Jones brings to the role. Watching it today, it is impossible to think of anyone else in it. Rounding out the supporting cast are several truly gifted character actors, including scene stealer Rene Auberjonois, Brad Dourif and Raul Julia. Auberjonois is particularly good here and gives the film several brief comic interludes that Kershner works into the proceedings seamlessly.
The models themselves are, of course, all quite striking, with special mention going to both Darlanne Fluegel’s Lulu and Lisa Taylor’s Michele. One of the film’s biggest triumphs is that it allows these models to feel like real people. So often films centering in the fashion world are hampered by weak characterizations but both Fluegel and Taylor are given some wonderful scenes to work with here which makes their murder sequence one of the most spellbinding and moving. They would both appear in a 1978 Playboy spread advertising the film which I have unfortunately not seen.
The thing that I like most about Eyes Of Laura Mars, and the thing that I think separates it from most thrillers from the period, is the way it deliberately dismantles itself just past the middle point. It is easy to look upon the rather forced relationship between Dunaway and Jones as just a stab to bring more people into the theater, but by shifting the tone of the film from hard edged thriller to near sappy romance, Kershner is able to brilliantly set up one of the best pay offs in late seventies American cinema. The rather awkward romantic scenes between Dunaway and Jones only make sense and have a resonance about them after the film has ended, which helps the film gain strength in its reviewings. Kershner is a smart filmmaker and, less a commercial ploy, the sudden switch in tone in the film is actually quite clever.
It is that switch that I believe John Carpenter and many critcs don’t like about the film. Carpenter would have made Eyes Of Laura Mars a much more straight ahead and go for the throat thriller but Kershner seems much more interested in manipulating the audience in different ways. I think Carpenter’s film would have been a real winner, but that shouldn’t take away from Kershner’s work.
Another aspect that has divided fans of the film is the themes song by Streisand that plays at the beginning, end, and at various points throughout the film. I happen to adore the song and think it is one of Streisand’s career defining performances. It also happens to fit the film and Laura Mars character perfectly and I frankly can’t imagine the film without it. Still, it remains a sore spot to some who see Eyes Of Laura Mars as nothing but a slick and pandering piece of commercial filmmaking.
Eyes Of Laura Mars opened in the late summer of 1978 and was a sizeable hit. Critical reaction was mixed but the fans ate it up and it grossed three times its budget throughout the late part of the year. It would also do well in Europe, especially in France where Carpenter’s inventive original story and Kershner’s stylish direction caught the eye of several prominent film critics.
Carpenter has all but disowned the film and has been very vocal about his dislike for the final product. Dunaway would have a couple of minor hits in the late seventies before her career was pretty much destroyed after the disastrous reception that greeted 1981’s ill fated Mommie Dearest. Although she still acts to this day, Eyes Of Laura Mars remains her absolute peak as one of the screen’s great performers and beauties.

Kirshner began work on The Empire Strikes Back right after production on Eyes Of Laura Mars wrapped and his work on that film would be just as spectacular and innovative. His career after is unfortunately scatter shot with only the unofficial James Bond picture Never Say Never Again really show flashes of his obvious brilliance again (although some could make a case for his Robocop 2 as well).
Eyes Of Laura Mars is a rare breed of commercial filmmaking. Like the memorable photographs that Mars takes in the film, there is a lot more to it than just an average middle of the road thriller. Drawing on a real palatable aesthetic, Kershner’s film feels as fresh, alive and as sinister as it did thirty years ago. The current DVD of it features a solid commentary from the director, a vintage behind the scenes feature called Visions and the participation of important DVD producer Laurent Bouzereau who rightly puts the film in its place as one of the most under looked classics of late seventies American cinema.

Far Out Films From The Seventies: The Hospital

Paddy Chayefsky could have re-written the Bible and he would still be primarily known for his incredibly prophetic and biting screenplay for 1976's NETWORK. All of the wonderful work the talented Chayefsky did before and after NETWORK has essentially become a footnote.
Chayefsky's ferociously funny screenplay for 1971's THE HOSPITAL is the key to one of the great, under the radar, films of the seventies. Acidic, honest, touching and always extremely funny, Arthur Hiller's film of one of Chayefsky's best scripts is rarely mentioned among the best films of the seventies, but it remains a topical and brutal look at health care and just what it means to be a doctor.
George C. Scott gives one of his great performances as, the just over the edge and suicidal, Dr. Bock. Along with HARDCORE, I think this is the most underrated work of Scott's distinguished career. He garnered one of the film's two Oscar nominations (Chayefsky's script got the other) as best actor but lost to Gene Hackman's astonishing performance as Popeye Doyle in Friedkin's THE FRENCH CONNECTION.
Scott is joined by an incredibly eclectic group of actors including Diana Rigg, Barnard Hughes, Richard Dysart and Nancy Marchand. Stockard Channing appears in a brief unbilled role as does Christopher Guest.
The film with its wild plot of serial killers, deadly wrong diagnoses and hard hitting political questions is handled expertly by, the sometimes pedestrian filmmaker, Hiller. Coming shortly after his smash LOVE STORY and right before the disastrous MAN OF LA MANCHA, Hiller is intelligent enough to bring a very un-showy touch to the already electric script. Chayefsky's writing is incredibly smart and did I mention funny? Along with THE HEARTBREAK KID and MASH, Hiller's film remains one of the funniest of the early 70s. The fact that it is also a very serious social critique is equally important, like the all out attack on the problems with the media in NETWORK, THE HOSPITAL successfully brings up some serious issues, regarding health care in this country, that continues to plague us to this day.
Scott's amazing performance controls the film but the rest of the cast is also notably good. Rigg's hippie daughter of a dying patient is especially solid. Nearly unrecognizable from Emma Peel we find Rigg giving one of her most complex and engaging performances here.
THE HOSPITAL is a film almost entirely built on situations and dialogue. From the iconic opening Chayefsky narration (which seems like a dry run for not only NETWORK but Paul Thomas Anderson's MAGNOLIA) to any number of extraordinary monologues by Scott, THE HOSPITAL is a film constructed on some of the sharpest dialogue ever written for a film. The words and ideas of the film are indeed so complex and well organized that even after viewing it half a dozen times or so I still find myself surprised at the film's numerous plot twists.
Hiller's film also has a nice unfussy look about it thanks to director of photographer Victor J. Kemper. Kemper would garner much acclaim in film and television throughout the seventies in films ranging from Sidney Lumet's DOG DAY AFTERNOON to Irvin Kershner's THE EYES OF LAURA MARS. I like his work in THE HOSPITAL a lot as he uses just a very basic pattern of colors that puts the audience directly into the very antiseptic and rather bland environment of the hospital itself.
Also worth noting is several well known faces that pop up in small supporting roles in the film. These include future award winning and popula performers such as Stockard Channing and THIS IS SPINAL TAP star and co-creator Christopher Guest. The entire and rather large ensemble cast of THE HOSPITAL is just terrific and none ever hit a false note.
THE HOSPITAL quietly influenced a couple of generations of medical comedies and dramas, ranging from YOUNG DOCTORS IN LOVE to E.R.. It is available on Dvd from MGM in a bare bones Widescreen presentation. I am happy the film is out but a special edition, to go along with the incredible double disc collection of NETWORK, would be most welcome.
For lovers of American cinema in the seventies or just cinema in general, I highly recommend this often overlooked gem of a film. It'll make you laugh, think and perhaps most importantly...it might make you question things you never would have thought to.

Far Out Films From The Seventies: Shock

The Original Version Of This Article Can Be Found Here At Moon In The Gutter.

1977's SHOCK (BEYOND THE DOOR 2) is mainly remembered as the final theatrical feature from the great Mario Bava. Assisted by his son and future director Lamberto Bava SHOCK is one of the most haunting and effective Italian horror films of the Seventies. Backed by a brilliant score from Libra (featuring members of Goblin) this intense psychologically disturbing feature was first released in the United States as a sequel to Ovidio Assonitis' underrated BEYOND THE DOOR which had also featured young David Colin Jr. While BEYOND THE DOOR was obviously influenced by THE EXORCIST, Mario Bava's SHOCK had much more in common with Polanski's REPULSION from 10 years earlier as well as Larraz's SYMPTOMS from earlier in the seventies. As portraits of a characters descent into total madness it is hard to beat REPULSION, SYMPTOMS and SHOCK. REPULSION featured one of the great performances by Catherine Deneuve while Bava's SHOCK was blessed with an incedibly good turn by underrated Italian actress Dario Nicolodi. Nicolodi's underrated performance is the highlight of her career and one of the great turns by an actor in any of Mario Bava's impressive filmography.
Nicolodi is a really interesting actress and has always cut an unique figure in all of her work. Her personal life as Dario Argento's significant other in the Seventies and as Asia Argento's mother has unfortunately overshadowed her career in film. This is a shame, as she was much more than just a girlfriend to Argento. Her work acting in front of his camera brought much to several of his films, especially her great turn in DEEP RED. Also of major importance is her work on the story and screen play to SUSPIRIA. It is probably very true that Dario Argento's famed career in the mid to late 70s would have been very different were it not for Nicolodi.
Small supporting roles and her work in Argento's tremendous DEEP RED were all that Nicolodi had under her acting belt when Bava cast her as the lead in SHOCK. She would turn in a performance though, as troubled mother and widow Dora, that would rank among the great work in the Italian Horror genre. It is hard to think of a more emotional and fully realized performance in Italian horror than the one Nicolodi delivers in SHOCK.
One thing that I admire so much about Daria's performance in this film is how authentic it feels. There is never a moment where this feels like caricature. Actually it could be said that this film succeeds as a great film of family dysfunction as well as a supernatural thriller.
Bava seemed to realize the kind of performance Nicolodi was giving as it feels like his camera rarely leaves her. The film's great moments come when she is alone in her bedroom or in various parts of the house. As Daria becomes more and more isolated and afraid of her son, and her past, Bava camera seems to center completely on her and her remarkably expressive face.
Bava's striking trademark economical effects are incredible here as he makes household items such as a piano and bits of moving furniture completely terrifying. One of the great moments in the film is a certain scene that has been copied many times (most recently in the Edgar Wright's DON'T trailer from GRINDHOUSE) of a child running down the hall, briefly disappearing and re-appearing as a grown man. It is a great, subtle and potent scare and while SHOCK isn't typically considered one of Bava's great masterpieces (some consider it Lamberto Bava's first film as much as Mario's last) it remains a terrifically inventive and truly frightening work.
Nicolodi is particularly unforgettable in the film's final few minutes when it finally becomes apparent what is really happening to her. Her last moment on screen is still one of the most shocking things I have ever seen. Bava's filming of Nicoldi in her final moments is one of the most disturbing shots in his entire canon. It would be a shot and ending that would recall one of his earlier works but the combination of elements would give it a much more overpoweringly intense and visceral feel. I am trying to not give this final bit away for people who have not seen this film but I warn you, it is not easily shaken.
SHOCK is also helped greatly by fine supporting turns by John Steiner and Ivan Rassimov and David Colin Jr. remains one of the creepiest screen kids in film history. Second Unit director Nicola Salerno is also very effective in the unbilled role of Carlo.
The film is also gorgeous to look at and was shot by Bava himself and talented Alberto Spagnoli. Spagnoli had started out his career as a cinematographer just a few years earlier in the unforgettable Emilio Miraglia giallo THE RED QUEEN KILLS SEVEN TIMES and would continue to shoot some popular Italian Genre films through the seventies and eighties for directors ranging from Joe D'Amato and Ruggero Deodato. He would tragically pass away in 1985.
I have watched SHOCK many times and I think Daria's performance gets even better upon re-viewings. It is a mulit-layered performance of someone in a lot of emotional trouble. The one problem I have with Shock is an extra scene at the end involving the son which has always bothered me as it calls into question much of what Bava has presented in the rest of the film. Still, SHOCK remains to me one of Bava's most underrated films and one of the defining Italian Horror films of the seventies.

Daria would continue to work with Mario Bava in the last two projects he was involved in, the tv work with Lamberto VENUS OF ILLE and Argento's INFERNO. She would work throughout the eighties and nineties in front of and behind the camera but SHOCK remains her greatest role and performance.
Nicolodi recently completed filming the long awaited finale to Dario Argento's THREE MOTHERS trilogy, which marked the first time they have worked together in 20 years. In probably the most anticipated Italian Horror film in at least 30 years Daria will be joined onscreen by her daughter, the award winning Asia Argento, and Udo Kier among others. Whether or not Dario can deliver a film worthy of SUSPIRIA and INFERNO remains to be seen but I can't wait to find out.
SHOCK is currently back in print from BLUE UNDERGROUND in a fine widescreen uncut print that also features an interesting interview with Lamberto Bava.
An official website for Daria should be online any time now and will be found at this address:
http://www.darianicolodi.it/
She also has a Myspace account here worth visiting: http://www.myspace.com/darianicolodiofficial

Stone Foxes Of The Seventies: Ornella Muti

The Original Version Of This Article Appeared Here At Moon In The Gutter.


"Cass was the most beautiful girl in town. 1/2 Indian with a supple and strange body, a snake-like and fiery body with eyes to go with it. Cass was fluid moving fire. She was like a spirit stuck into a form that would not hold her. Her hair was black and long and silken and whirled about as did her body. Her spirit was either very high or very low. There was no in between for Cass. Some said she was crazy. The dull ones said that. The dull ones would never understand Cass."
-Charles Bukowski-

Has there ever been anyone as beautiful as Ornella Muti? So striking she is almost alien, and with a searing intensity that is almost terrifying. Ornella haunts my dreams to this day and she is one of the few people who have inhabited planet earth that I really couldn't imagine being in the same room with, Elvis, Marilyn Monroe, Alain Delon, Klaus and Nastassja Kinski are the others that come to mind.

I don't know a lot about Ornella. She was born in Rome in the spring of 55 where I am sure as a young girl she probably haunted every boy she would meet. She modeled throughout her teens and started making movies right as the seventies began. Throughouth the decade she appeared in some of the most memorable and often confrontational films of the period for directors ranging from Joe D'Amato to Franco Rossi. She would began shooting more and more mainstream English language productions after 1980's FLASH GORDON. Ornella did her best work in the seventies and was at the absolute peak of her beauty in the period. Her finest work came especially with one key director, the always controversial and fascinating Marco Ferreri.
I should write a long post celebrating Ornella Muti the actress, as she is clearly one of the most talented on the planet. One glance at her filmography, especially her films with Marco Ferreri, will tell you this. However, that will have to come in the future as I just wanted to celebrate in a few short lines the extraordinary beauty of this woman.

I am not sure who exactly Charles Bukowski had in mind when he wrote the above lines but Marco Ferreri showed his genius when he cast Ornella as Cass in his TALES OF ORDINARY MADNESS. It is a great work and like Ben Gazzara's drunken and lonely poet in the film, Ornella Muti breaks my heart every time I watch it....

So Ciao Bella...occasionally God gets everything right.
For more information on Ornella may I recommend her official website. For those who haven't seen her work with Marco Ferreri I highly recommend tracking them down by any means necessary. The handful of films they made together represent one of the great, if brief, partnerships in modern cinema.


I will be posting more photos of Ornella later this evening to go along with this post...

Far Out Films From The Seventies, Rabid

For his second full length feature film, RABID (RAGE), Director David Cronenberg originally wanted to cast a young actress named Sissy Spacek for the lead role of Rose. His Canadian backers fought against Spacek as they wanted a 'name' actress that could fill the seats. They had no way of knowing that as RABID went into production Spacek would become an overnight sensation with her powerful performance in De Palma's CARRIE.
The financiers of RABID, including future director Ivan Reitman, made an admittedly odd and risky move and brought in adult film star Marilyn Chambers to play the pivotal lead role, Rose. Chambers, while known mostly for her work in The Mitchell Brothers' BEHIND THE GREEN DOOR, had worked in the early seventies Sean Cunningham-Wes Craven project TOGETHER but RABID would be her first large role in a mainstream production.
Chambers had started out her career with some modeling, including the mother on the famous Ivory Snow box, but her life was forever altered after being discovered at a Mitchell Brothers casting session at the age of 19.
Her work in BEHIND THE GREEN DOOR made her an instant underground sensation and forever solidified her as one of the three most famous adult stars of the seventies. Unlike most of her adult world peers though Chambers possessed a real charisma and charm in front of the camera and she had a natural and fresh acting ability that Cronenberg was successfully able to tap into.
RABID is my favorite of the early David Cronenberg films and it is a textbook example of not just his early obsessions but also of how to make an independent, low budget film. Much of RABIDS strength comes not just from Cronenberg's remarkably smart direction and script but from Chambers, who gives an absolutely pitch perfect performance as the very doomed Rose.
Cronenberg was obviously aware that he was working with a relatively inexperienced actress so many of the film's finest moments come through moments of silence, rather than dialogue. The incredible opening shot is a good example with Rose standing silent as Cronenberg's camera pans around her. Chamber's has one of the great faces of the seventies and Cronenberg makes good use of it especially in the opening shot and with a particular screaming close up of her in the hospital a bit later.

Chamber's would say of Cronenberg on RABID'S 25th anniversary in a interview with Rue Morgue, "he really calmed me down and said 'less is a lot more'". It was a good piece of advise as the silent spots of RABID make its more chilling and explosive moments all the more intense.
There are so many great moments in RABID that it is hard to single specifics out. One shot that sticks with me is Chambers walking through the cold Canadian city getting hungrier and looking for her next victim. She passes a poster of CARRIE, Cronenberg's sly wink to Spacek, and decides to go into an adult movie theater.
Rose is a remarkable character because she is so tragic, there is never a moment in the film where Cronenberg lets us forget that the killing and feeding she is doing isn't by choice but by need. Upon escaping from the hospital for the first time Rose attempts to feed from a cow and immediately gets ill. Chambers is great in this moment as she lightly pets the cow as if to say, "I'm sorry".
Everything about RABID, from the chilling library score to the final bleak closing shot, is perfect to me. The bleak and chilled look of the film is particularly striking and can be credited to famed Candian cinematographer Rene Verzier, who had just shot another one of Canadian's cinemas best from the seventies, THE LITTLE GIRL WHO LIVES DOWN THE LANE. The special effects by Al Griswold and Joe Elsner are also extremely well done and overwhelmingly creepy, with special mention going to the terrifying new appendage that appears out of Rose's armpit throughout the film.
RABID is often overlooked by even Cronenberg's most dedicated fans and that is truly unfortunate. VIDEODROME might be the ultimate expression and culmination of Cronenberg's art but you can literally watch him build his own mythology in his earliest films, specifically RABID.
After early doubts and some problems on the set with her boyfriend Cronenberg grew to respect Chambers and has said many good things about her and her work as Rose. He also expressed regret that she didn't have more success in later mainstream films. I share that regret.
Chambers would never again be given the opportunity to give a performance as good as Rabid. There would be more films, some straight...some adult...a brief singing career...personal problems...arrests and finally resolution as reports now have her at her happiest with a daughter and a much calmer life.
RABID is out in a couple of different DVD versions. The orginnal reagion one disc is bare bones and features just a full screen presentation, but it is a must have for people who grew up watching this film on VHS as it accurately reflects that presentation. The real way to go is the Candian special edition which features a widescreen cut, and a fantastic long interview and commentary by Cronenberg. If the film does have another release in the future, one would hope that Chambers would be contacted for an interview and commentary as she seems to have very fond feelings towards the film.
RABID isn't often mentioned among the best Cronenberg films but it is a real personal favorite to me. It's like watching one of the great masters beginning one of his most ambitious pieces, a piece that he has continued to build upon, refine and improve in his remarkable 30 plus year career. The film remains one of his most important works and Marilyn Chamber's performance in it is one of the finest ever given for him.