Jediclampett Reviews

The Gun Is Loaded (1989)

In your face confrontational fun

[7/10 · 28 June 2005]

Do you want a buxom foul-mouthed loud punk-rocker chick spewing rage and doom at you? I thought so, then this is the featurette for you. You complacent beer swilling couch potato- hey, wait that's me !

1988, Lydia Lunch lays down this end -of- the Reagan era rant mixing on -target social commentary with her own personal anger. AND THIS LADY'S REALLY ANGRY. Don't honk her off in a diner or you might be wearing that lasagna home, bub. Lydia Lunch Delivers her scathing postmodern sermon first from a studio, then from various blight sites in the big apple; which form a fitting backdrop for her zesty bleakness. Politicians, parents, men and American consumerism all take a beating from the Duchess of Darkness. So if you enjoy unresolved rage, exhilarating profanity and timeless critiques of politics and human nature check out - THE GUN IS LOADED.

Cléo from 5 to 7 (1962)

Life and Movement in the shadow of Death

[8/10 · 22 June 2005]

"Cleo from 5 to 7" tells the story of a young French singer, who fears that she may be seriously ill. What could have been maudlin "movie of the week" soap opera, is transformed by Agnes Varda into a unique movie experience.

The film contrasts Cleo's fear of death with the teeming life of the Paris streets, where street entertainers swallow live frogs and puncture their biceps; and the more normal members of the crowd busy themselves with the usual affairs of business and the heart. A large amount of the film takes place outdoors, with Cleo and the people in her life always walking, running or driving. There is a wonderful scene of Cleo-Distraught over an ominous tarot reading by the fortune teller- descending a circular staircase, her shoe heels clicking out a counterpoint to Michel Legrand's pensive music.

Sometimes just watching the way someone moves is very revealing. Director Varda has a fluid camera style which enlivens every scene. As often happens in European art films the story unfolds in a slow undramatic fashion, but their is so much going on in the image and the text, that you don't mind. Essential viewing.