Vintage Trailer of the Week 24
I watched "Not Quite Hollywood" recently. Its a great little documentary about the "Ozploitation" Cinema which came from Australia in the late 60s, 70s and early 80s. It did what all such pieces should - it made me want to see a hell of a lot of films I've never seen. It also got me thinking about Australian cinema. Peter Weir, unquestionably Australia's greatest ever director to my mind, is mentioned only in passing in the film. He is referred to in oppositional terms, as one of the exponents of Australia's artier, heritage cinema. "Picnic at Hanging Rock" is the subject of a a few bitchy comments for its tastefulness, its subtlety, its seeming pretension.
Yet there are clips from Weir's wonderfully bizarre debut, "The Cars That Ate Paris" in a couple of the film's montages, which go unacknowledged. It and his second feature, "The Last Wave", are more closely related to Ozploitation than many would suspect, in their genre content and basic aesthetics. But Weir cannot help trying to elevate his material, making the films curious exercises in contradiction, albeit with an unerring grasp of nuance and tone. "The Last Wave" features Richard Chamberlain, and much of its scarily prophetic appeal is obvious in this trailer:
Yet there are clips from Weir's wonderfully bizarre debut, "The Cars That Ate Paris" in a couple of the film's montages, which go unacknowledged. It and his second feature, "The Last Wave", are more closely related to Ozploitation than many would suspect, in their genre content and basic aesthetics. But Weir cannot help trying to elevate his material, making the films curious exercises in contradiction, albeit with an unerring grasp of nuance and tone. "The Last Wave" features Richard Chamberlain, and much of its scarily prophetic appeal is obvious in this trailer:
Labels: trailer
posted by David N at 9:02 am
2 Comments:
I don't have any contact details for you so this message is entirely unrelated to your post because I am feverishly trying to find a film, and it isn't available, but you seem like one of the people around who might know how to get it. And, goddamit, I shan't wait until Thursday to ask you.
'Housekeeping' (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0093225/) which is a 1987 adaptation of the Marilynne Robinson book of the same name. Now, the book is one of my favourites and the trailer (watch it, it is slight) is awful. I need to see it to ensure the film isn't pitched in the same way -- genteel, borderline whimsical, little japes and glee. The book is devastating! It is a study of loneliness, mental illness and isolation. Suicide and depression – it is steeped in it! It is about womanhood, poverty and a cold America.
A quote from Le Anne Schreiber in The New York Times Book Review: "Marilynne Robinson has written a first novel that one reads as slowly as poetry—and for the same reason: the Language is so precise, so distilled, so beautiful that one doesn't want to miss any pleasure it might yield up to patience." Does that trailer give any hint of that? If the prose was a colour it would be grey, a washed out grey.
I am distraught! How could they...? Etc, etc.
Yours, disgruntled from London
(rupachawda@yahoo.co.uk)
Ian is my unavailable-movie pimp. Failing that try eBay (you already have, I imagine) and there are a couple of websites that deal in DVDRs of deleted or never-released films.
But the obvious thing would be to download it if its on bit torrent...
How could they? Revolutionary Road. Ulysses, for God's sake. Rabbit, run, Catch 22, slaughterhouse five etc etc...
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