cinema history class: the witch's mirror (1962)

The session: "Ten-Year Anniversary Celebration"
The four of us who have been in the class since the beginning (or nearly so) each pick a favorite to revisit

As always, there may be spoilers here. And the trailer may be NSFW and/or NSFL.

Week 1: The Witch's Mirror (1962)
                    (Joe's pick)
Directed by Chano Urueta

My Impressions Going In:

I didn't really remember this one.

Plot:

After murdering his wife, a man remarries. But his first wife wants revenge

Reaction and Other Folderol:

Joe opened this special session with a heartfelt speech about what the class has meant to him. He touched on Keith's devotion and dedication, and how it has enriched his appreciation of old horror movies. I had been expecting Joe to choose Night of the Living Dead  or Freaks because I know how much those two iconic horror films mean to him. But he had other plans. He chose The Witch's Mirror, the 1962 Mexican horror film. For me, it's one of many films that blended together.* But it was the third movie Keith showed us and, for Joe, that was the movie that convinced him the class could work.

In many ways WM played like an extended episode of The Twilight Zone (which kind of makes sense given the timeframe of when it was created), but there are also a lot of elements of Poe thrown in. At points it was interesting, and there were some good elements, but I found it to be very slow-moving.

Ratings

Because we all saw this years ago, we decided not to rerate it (though admittedly when we originally saw it we hadn't been giving ratings). Since Bob-O wasn't around when Keith first showed it to us, he gets to rate it now.

Bob-O: 9.5

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*No disrespect intended, but we have screened 50 or so movies a year for ten years. There are certainly a lot of standouts, but many of the films have kind of blended together in my mind.

cinema history class: supervixens (1975)

The session: "Spring! When a Young Man's Thoughts Turn to Russ Meyer"
This month we pay tribute to director Russ Meyer

As always, there may be spoilers here. And the trailer may be NSFW and/or NSFL.

Week 4: Supervixens (1975)
Directed by Russ Meyer

My Impressions Going In:

I may have been vaguely aware of the film's existence. But I'm not sure.

Plot:

A mild-mannered gas station attendant goes from sexual romp to sexual romp while trying to escape the evil cop who framed him for his wife's murder.

Reaction and Other Folderol:

After Vixen! the prior week, I was coming in to Supervixens (no, it's not a sequel) with low expectations.  And, like the predecessor, SV isn't a good movie. But it's not as bad.

The biggest problem with SV is the disjointed nature of the plot. Clint's adventures with various women seem more like separate episodes than parts of a coherent whole. And the dialogue itself is often silly.

That said, there's a way that the film can be enjoyable if you put your brain on neutral. And most of the credit for that goes to Charles Napier who did a great job as the psychotic cop, Harry Sledge. He may have been a two-dimensional cartoon character, but he was so damn demented that it was fun to watch him. That said, Charles Pitt (Clint) also deserves some credit. Clint was the only really likeable character in the film, and gave the whole project a bit of feeling.

As with his other movies, Meyer seems to throw in odd bits of schtick that make no real sense. For example, Clint's boss is named Martin Bormann, and a running theme in the movie is that he seems to actually be the Martin Bormann. It seems like some kind of elaborate inside joke.* Some might fault the movie for this, but I actually find it amusing.

Ratings

Me: 6

Bob-O: 7.5 

Dave: 8.5

Ethan: 8

Joe: 10

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*Or maybe it was a not-so-elaborate inside joke. Maybe Meyer simply thought "Gee, wouldn't it be funny if one of the characters is an actual Nazi war criminal? And maybe we just kind of reference it matter-of-factly."

cinema history class: vixen! (1968)

The session: "Spring! When a Young Man's Thoughts Turn to Russ Meyer"
This month we pay tribute to director Russ Meyer

As always, there may be spoilers here. And the trailer may be NSFW and/or NSFL.

Week 3: Vixen! (1968)
Directed by Russ Meyer

My Impressions Going In:

I may have been vaguely aware of the film's existence. But I'm not sure.

Plot:

Vixen Palmer, the wife of a tourism pilot in rural Canada, likes to seduce anyone and anything.

Reaction and Other Folderol:

I suppose if I wanted to be charitable, I could give Vixen points for being groundbreaking. It was the first film to earn the MPAA's X rating for sexual content.* So Meyer was trying to break ground and innovate.

But there's just no way around the fact that Vixen! is not a good movie. The characters are unlikeable and uninteresting. Well, I suppose there are some interesting aspects to the title character, played by Erica Gavin. But even so, I just couldn't really care about her. That was combined with a weak plot. In fairness, the movie did develop something that could have been an interesting plot if it had been brought in earlier. That being the storyline about the Irish Communist who wants to fly to Cuba. If that had started earlier and had the movie devoted more time to it, things would have been better. But in the event, it was just a rompfest of Vixen screwing anyone she could -- including her brother.

Well, anyone except Niles (Harrison Page). She won't sleep with Niles (despite her brother's efforts to make that happen) because he's black. Instead, she continually heaps racist abuse at him, using almost every anti-black slue in the book (except, oddly, the most obvious one). And it would seem that the only reason for that angle is to turn the movie into some kind of anti-racist statement. Which is fine, though a bit ham-handed. But, combined with the sexual nature of the main plot, the antiracist message gives the movie a distinct split personality. On a related note, the anti-communist and anti-draft-dodger messages are treated clumsily and seem out of place.

Circling back, I'll note that Meyer's experimental idea of showing people seeing things that aren't there was kind of interesting. But like the rest of the film, it was clumsy.

Ratings

Me: 3.5

Christina: 4.8

Dave: 8.5

Ethan: 4

Joe: 8.5

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*A bunch of websites seem to give that credit to Brian De Palma's Greetings (also from 1968). But I suspect that they're overlooking Vixen! because of its low-budget nature.

cinema history class: motor psycho (1965)

 The session: "Spring! When a Young Man's Thoughts Turn to Russ Meyer"

This month we pay tribute to director Russ Meyer

As always, there may be spoilers here. And the trailer may be NSFW and/or NSFL.

Week 2: Motor Psycho
Directed by Russ Meyer

My Impressions Going In:

Never heard of it. Never saw it. And I still haven't...

Plot:

As near as I can tell, there's lots of motorcycles and action.

Reaction and Other Folderol:

The stars did not align, so I couldn't make it to class. I didn't see the movie and have no reaction. I'm posting this just for the sake of completeness. Kurt Godel would be proud of me.

Ratings

Bob-O: 8.3

Christina: 7.9

Dave: 9

Joe: 10

cinema history class: faster, pussycat! kill! kill! (1965)

 The session: "Spring! When a Young Man's Thoughts Turn to Russ Meyer"

This month we pay tribute to director Russ Meyer

As always, there may be spoilers here. And the trailer may be NSFW and/or NSFL.

Week 1: Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill!)
Directed by Russ Meyer

My Impressions Going In:

I'd long known of this film's existence. But other than knowing it's a cult classic that I just gotta see, I knew very little about it.

Plot:

Three strippers take off into the dessert to let off steam. They don't have any serious plans until they learn of a hidden cache of cash.

Reaction and Other Folderol:

I went into this session with high hopes. I was aware of Faster Pussycat as some kind of iconic countercultural cult film. And given my tastes and interests, it's actually kind of surprising that I had never seen this before.

Boy, was I disappointed. The plot was weak, and the story telling was uneven. And none of the characters were likeable. But what bugged me the most was the way all the characters were overacting. This was especially true of Tura Satana, who starred as Varla; she seemed to end each line with a rising tone, which seemd like it was supposed to sound emphatic -- but just sounded hacky. Keith explained that that was purposeful -- a directorial choice on Meyer's part. Why he made that choice I'll never know. But in a sense, that kind of makes sense. A lot of the movie felt like it was a series of film school experiments. If Meyer was playing with a variety of styles, it makes sense that he would experiment with his characters' emotions. The problem, though, is that it made the movie harder to watch.

On the plus side, the ending was great. With its red herrings and teasers, It had me on the edge. Sadly, though, that just couldn't save it.

Ratings

Me: 5

Bob-O: 8.6

Christina: 9.1

Dave: 8.5

Ethan: 6

Joe: 10

Sharon: 8