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La Jetee directed by Chris Marker. Film directed by Samuel Beckett. Towers Open Fire directed by William S. Burroughs.
Chris Marker's influential short LA JETEE (1963) first brought to the screen what are now considered "cutting edge" SF cyberpunk ideas such as neural networks, wired cities, and virtual visions (see further: MATRIX, THE).
Marker was way ahead of the curve, in other words, and he only used one moving image. The rest are all still images, rapidly edited together ala a film, with a terrific and haunting plot that draws you in. A storyline whose influence on THE TERMINATOR is clear
enough, as is the
story being the literal source for Terry Gilliam's epic version THE 12TH
MONKEY. For his efforts, Marker won the Prix Jean Vigo that year
for Best Short Film and -- most enduringly -- a place in SF cult history.Interestingly, Marker himself admits that much like the accidental editing pattern of Godard's BREATHLESS, LA JETEE's use of still images derives (happily in retrospect) from the lab's ruining more of the live action footage than Marker (right) could salvage on his meager budget. So, after some despair, cigarettes and
coffee, he came up with the solution: isolate still images, enhance them
photographically, and make the limitation an advantage. Would today's
digital cameras and Power Mac's ever provide so daunting a task and therefore
as inspiring results? As LA JETEE reminds us, only time
knows all to tell.
Plus, on the
same triple bill, Samuel Beckett's eerie FILM, a weirdly
hypnotic silent short starring Buster Keaton. The subject matter is almost
indescribable, but since that's never stopped us before: an old man (Keaton)
fetches the daily newspaper in his derelict neighborhood, imagining the
harmless locals to be nefarious. But back home in his humble hovel, the
old man's delusions and illusions are just beginning. Soon he finds himself
falling into a continuous trap of self-looping in which he experiences
deja vu and reality at the same time.
Whew, told you it wasn't easy! The plot is pointless, anyway, as the flick
concentrates and ultimately relies on the impact of Keaton's brutally-cragged
face in Leonesque close-ups as much as any narrative. Combined with the
fluid, out-of-body shots of Keaton floating around his room that echoes
Fellini's JULIET OF THE SPIRITS for creating a cinematic sense of spatial
disorientation and FILM delivers on 
Beckett's
and Keaton's reputations for successfully pushing boundaries.
The final
part of this surreal trilogy is TOWERS OPEN FIRE!, the
Anthony Balch produced and co-directed cinematic rendering of some of
William S. Burroughs' infamous "routines." The stoic-faced Burroughs
opens the flick in granite close-up, unflinching, as his gravel-filled
voice rants about race-mixing on the narration. Other choice images include
Burroughs as a mystic CEO who uses black magic to banish the works of
flickmakers deemed "too savvy" for the duped masses to behold
and handheld footage of Burroughs in a wintery park looking (what else?)
bitter and lonely.
If your cup of tea runs to Earl Grey over Lipton Instant®, you'll appreciate LA JETEE all the more, but even casual fans of such later "inspired by" works such as THE 12TH MONKEY and NAKED LUNCH will get a kick out of seeing the obscure origins. -- Notes by P.R. Deltoid.
What Critics Say:
"LA
JETEE’s fans insist that it’s the finest science fiction
film ever made, and why not? ... It's no exaggeration, finally, to say
that LA JETEE may represent film's closest approach to poetry."
-- ROTTEN TOMATOES.COM, '10 HYPNOTIC EXPERIENCES'
"[LA JETEE]... One of the best of all SF films." -- CHICAGO
READER"[FILM]... As Keaton arranges and rearranges the things in his sparse living quarters, and goes through pictures of himself, often hiding from the camera, you begin to see what's going on: is he, the character, only who he sees in the mirror, and in pictures, or is he other than that? Keaton lends it a few touches of his by now archetypal humor -- wholly improvised -- which Beckett found delightful. This is a unique work that any serious student of film should have in her/his library." -- IMDB.com
Last
Dinosaur, The Starring Richard Boone & Joan van Ark. Dino EFX by Kaziro Sagawa. Produced by Arthur Rankin & Jules Bass.
Think
about Arthur Rankin and Jules Bass and most people think of stop motion
TV specials like RUDOLPH THE RED-NOSED REINDEER, which still turns up
on TV stations at Christmas time. They also gave us the 1967 MAD MONSTER
PARTY (which was bankrolled by Mad Magazine, which is why the word "Mad"
is repeated so often during the title song) and several Saturday morning
cartoon shows.
THE
LAST DINOSAUR, a 1977 made-for-TV thriller, was filmed in Japan
with the help of Toho Studios. Great, you are thinking, this must be
a classic! Well... let's have a look and then you can decide for yourself.
Marsden
Thrust (Richard Boone) is a self made millionaire and big game hunter
who has 
tracked
down and killed every type of animal there is except for one: a dinosaur.
When he hears about some scientists who believe that there is a prehistoric
world hidden under the Antarctic ice he sees a chance to add a stuffed
dinosaur to his trophy room and offers the use oif his latest invention,
the Thrust Polar Borer (it's even labeled on one side) to go explore
the lost world.
Quicker than you can say THE LAND UNKNOWN, Thrust and
company
are popping up in the middle of the prehistoric world. With his trusty
gun bearer (Luther Rackley) close by Marsden goes looking for his latest
quarry (I kept hoping someone would say "Have gun, will travel"
but no one does) and right away the problems begin. 
The scientists just want to study any life they find
but Thrust is so rich and powerful he is used to getting things his
own way no matter what 
and
insists they capture a giant dino alive so he can make even more money
by exhibiting it. While they are debating, a flesh eating Tyrannosaurus
finds them!
Frankly I expected more from Toho's special effects department than delivered in THE LAST DINOSAUR. They could have loaned out the "Gorasaurus" costume from KING KONG ESCAPES but noooooooooooo! The monster we get is a plain, ordinary Tyrannosaurus. The costume is certainly authentic looking but the suitmation technique is no better than, say, THE LAND THAT TIME FORGOT or WARLORDS OF ATLANTIS.
The
monster stomps on one of the doctors (Tatsu Nakamura) and Thrust
decides it's time to get revenge ("This creature with a brain the
size of a dried pea has killed one of the greatest minds of our time!").
The others are
ready to scram. After all, they have to get back before the severe Antarctic
winter makes escape impossible.
This is where the movie becomes a "Who is the real
monster?" morality play as Thrust refuses to let anyone leave until
he has taken revenge on the beast that was only acting out of pure instinct.
You have to really wonder just whom the title is refering to, the monster
or Thrust himself whose 
macho
man attitude makes him seems like a "dinosaur" fighting a
losing battle against the modern world.
The cast of THE LAST DINOSAUR
is competant and they handle their parts well. Richard Boone started
his career in things like I BURY THE LIVING, which is a pretty scary
mystery until they totally let us down with a cop-out "rationalisation"
ending. Joan van Ark was also in 
FROGS
and Steven Keats was in the made for TV movie THE MYSTERIOUS ISLAND
OF BEAUTIFUL WOMEN (gee, I wonder what it was about?) and HANGAR 18.
Toho special effects tech Kaziro Sagawa was in charge
of the dino costume and also a life sized foot which was used for closeups.
In
America people could see this on TV for free. In Europe they had to
pay to see it theatrically.
-- Notes by Dr. Maniac.
What
Critics Say:
"THE
LAST DINOSAUR once ruled its world... there was a time, during
the late ‘80s, when our subject here was
constantly on the air... if you had cable, it seemed that two or three
times a month you would stumble across this film playing in all its
idiosyncratic 
glory."
-- Ken Begg, JABOOTU'S BAD MOVIE DIMENSION
"You really have to love dinosaurs to appreciate this cheap and ludricrous film... but if you want to see a dinosaur movie, the campiness won't bother you." -- aesgaard41, IMDB.com
"The
interesting thing about this film's title is that it does not refer
to the tyrannosaurus, but to Mr. Thrust. He is the last male artifact
from a forgotten age, when men were rich jerks. I didn't particularly
like Masten, but his dogged determination to kill the dinosaur eventually
caused me to respect the man." -- BAD MOVIES.org
Like
this flick? See Also: GAPPA;
GHIDRAH,
THE THREE-HEADED MONSTER; MYSTERIOUS
MONSTERS; PLANET
OF STORMS;
JOURNEY
TO THE BEGINNING OF TIME
Starring, Written and Directed by Ivan Marx.
This incredibly rare, hard-to-see "anti-Bigfoot" flick is infamous for its legendary treatment of the creature: completely disrespectful of both believer and non-believer alike! Not that you would know it, as it has been out-of-print for over a decade.
You have to really see THE LEGEND OF BIGFOOT
(1976) at least once in your life if you have even a passing fancy in
all 
things
Sasquatch. No kidding, the flick is hysterically inept and (yet like
the roadkill it chronicles) luridly voyeuristic in a rubberneck kind
of way.
And again, if you value Bigfoot, you can't help but
want to see it to be a compleatist. But if you believe, be prepared
to feel like you were fleeced. And if you don't buy into Bigfoot? You'll
be gleefully
amused by Marx's wicked sense of carny-esque salesmanship: he really
pours on it on thick with the hucksterisms.
My favorite scene? Jeez, there is so much that's great
herein for the bad movie lover that it would be dishonest to detail
too much. But some quick highlights include: Marx's ridiculous and graphically
illustrated theory about Bigfoot migrations in North America; his periodic
"chance"
encounters with the creatures (and always just as he arrives with his
16mm handy!); and his wife being forced to hold the camera while he
in a very unconvincing ape suit runs through the fields like some lovesick
'Squatch horny for a mate.
If you can watch the footage of Marx as Bigfoot in THE
LEGEND OF BIGFOOT -- Marx's trademark, bowlegged gait and lanky
frame clearly apparent beneath the ragged suit -- and keep from choking
with laughter on your beer you're a better and stronger-willed person
than me, let me tell you. Give his wife credit, too, for holding the
camera steady and not shaking with laughter while filming. ;)
What's truly reprehensible (but therein part of the deviant fun) is how pathologically idiotic Marx assumes his audience to be, expecting them to swallow his mocking tone of patronizing sincerity and ultra-belief in the critters as if listening to a preacher spewin' the Gospel Truth at a tent revival.
"Bigfoot!?" Marx barks in mock disgust in
the first reel before his sudden conversion to True Believer. "I'd
had about a belly full of Bigfoot!" The core believer will share
Marx's estimation, but not of the myth or monster, but of the man himself:
while a little goes a long way, Marx shouldn't be given an easy grade
for the 
condescension
so evidently on display, as it is not only directed at Bigfoot afficianados.
No, he plays to the lowest rung of the audience and still manages to offend. With his ludicrously inept footage, it's as if Marx is flagrantly showing his barely concealed disdain for the viewer who would actually sit through this con job and not, say, get up and demand her money back!
Not that he had disdain just for believers. In fact, Ivan Marx was once a "legitimate" hire in the employ of none other than famed Bigfoot researcher/"hunter" Peter Byrne! Yes, before being defrauded and left holding a bag of bills on behalf of Marx, Byrne had Marx on the payroll of a pro 'Squatch research group. Byrne's hilarious account of how they uncovered Marx's deception in staging photos he claimed real and Marx's subsequent vanishing into the night before they could confront him is priceless reading.
It's
that carny aspect, however, that makes THE LEGEND OF BIGFOOT
so unique in the otherwise all-too-serious and self-serious Cine du
Sasquatch. The flick is willing to be blatantly unbelievable about a
subject matter many find unbelievable, which manages to reduce either
belief or non-belief to complete irrevelency.
Like the traveling circus moving through your town, you have to be "taken" by a pro as slick and unrepentant as Marx to really feel used and abused. Shame on you if you resist the urge to take a peek just because you feel superior, either; Marx felt the same way and still managed to make a whole career and several feature flix out of his disdain! ;) -- Notes by Travis Crabtree.
What
Critics Say:
"A
priceless piece of faux-anthropological malarkey by lifelong Bigfoot
cheapjack Ivan Marx.... seems ripped from the craggy lips of the Marlboro
Man himself." -- CITY PAGES MOVIE REVIEWS
"When we weren’t talking about the movie, we were walking through dark woods, hoping that we might find tracks or clues that Sasquatch was afoot... we found a stash of waterlogged PLAYBOYS out there." -- Scott Adams, TELEPORT CITY
"Bigfoot
lovers will like this one." -- Novan, IMDB.com
"Si j'étais un bigfoot, j'attaquerais le réalisateur
en justice pour me faire passer pour un mollasson qui ramène
ses morts sur 500 kilomètres, tel un saumon ! Une longue séquence
sur un écureuil frappé par une voiture en achèvera
plus d'un ! Une curiosité pour amateur de bigfoot uniquement."
-- CLUB DES MONSTRES.com
"The
man whose prank launched the 'Bigfoot' legend in 1958 has died and family
members say they can now reveal 
the
truth: Ray L. Wallace was the Bigfoot in the movie [shot by Marx]. Wallace
died of heart failure Nov. 26 in Centralia, Wash." -- CBS
NEWS.com
"The
romantic notion of stalking this giant monster was publicized through
newspaper coverage and men's magazines (like TRUE, SAGA, and ARGOSY)
and attracted a small group of Bigfoot hunters, banded together by...inevitable
thoughts of financial prosperity. By 1959, Texas millionaire oilman
Tom Slick financed the Pacific Northwest Expedition, a group of men
including Bob Titmus, Ivan Marx, Rene Dahinden, and
John Green -- a group of men still prominent in the field today -- who
were commissioned to capture the beast... but the group as a whole did
little else but argue and eventually disbanded." -- Mark Opsasnick,
UFONET.it
Like this flick? See Also: BOG;
SASQUATCH,
THE LEGEND OF BIGFOOT; CREATURE
FROM BLACK LAKE; MAN
BEAST;
MYSTERIOUS
MONSTERS
