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DVD Slaughterhouse Five
Billy Pilgrim (Michael Sacks) has a problem with time: he keeps jumping about in his own life, principally between three key scenes. The "present" is a kind of glowing suburban bliss involving a dutiful wife, large house, and presidency of the local Lions; the "past" is being a prisoner of World War II and experiencing the firebombing of Dresden from the wrong side; the "future" takes place in a glass dome on the planet Tralfamadore, to which Billy has been mysteriously spirited along with the woman of his fantasies (Montana Wildhack, played by Valerie Perrine). It isn't meant to make too much sense, since the point is to represent a man (and a century) that has witnessed things too unbearable for a wholly sane person to make sense of. In fact author Kurt Vonnegut's anguished cry on the insanity of war is one of those completely unfilmable books, so director George Roy Hill gets points even for trying. The whole package is thought provoking in a wholly Vonnegutian way. All this, and Glenn Gould playing Bach as well. --Richard Farr
The past, the present and the future: memories, experience and hopes. This is what we create by living. To an unknown extent it is our actual creation, for 'reality' is a very human thing. Billy Pilgrim has been traumatised by war, as has his fellow soldiers. His lesson is: try to remember the good things, try and forget the bad things. It might not be a noble philosophy, but in a world where he does not easily fit, whether it is a concentration camp or a middle class blancmange dream home, it is valuable information to get him by. Slaughterhouse Five is a very rare thing, a film that tries to make sense both out of the atrocity of war and the hysterical blandness of conformity. It never falters. It is convincing from first scene to last, spun on the fulcrum of Michael Sacks' minimalist acting style, which veers from puzzled incomprehension to calm acceptance, while everybody around him goes their mad, mad way. 'Unstuck in time' means chronological time is abandoned for thematic paralleled jump cuts. The film is not experimental however. Its technique is more subtle. The temporal sequence is disrupted not by the director showing off his technique, which is the usual thing, but by the character's mind. Billy is in shock, and must heal himself. What an eerie species we must appear to extraterrestials. Bach has the last word (on the soundtrack, as he does in Solaris as well).
Fantastic drama of Science Fiction
"Slaughterhouse-Five" (1972 - 104 minutes) is a classic drama of science fiction, directed by George Roy Hill from the script of Stephen Geller that was based on the masterpiece of the North American writer Kurt Vonnegut Jr. The film shows the attempt of an American former-soldier (that fought in the Second World War and that witnessed the bombing of the city of Dresden) to write his experience of the war. Billy Pilgrim (the actor Michael Sacks), the protagonist, is a citizen who travels in time, goes to the Tralfamadore planet where he makes contact with aliens and revisits diverse moments of his own life, in the past, in the present and in the future. The crucial point of his existence is the episode where he was made prisoner during the Second War, when he lived the bombing of the German city in which had died 135 thousand people, the double of deaths of Hiroshima. The narrative is marvellous, fantastic, sarcastic, funny, satirical, ironic, sad, overwhelming and full of sense.
Important NOW more than ever, and Funnier than ever too!
Kurt V's film was a one part of a trilogy (unofficial, MY words..)one of the greatest, most subtle Anti-War 'protestations" produced in the "mainstream" of filmmaking.
Hollywood is usually more enthusiastic t promote the "glories" of war, and really IMO, I quote Erasmus in that "those who have never experienced war are the most enthusiastic for it." (these words of Erasmus, the Dutch philosopher were written in the 15th century, by the way).
(For all interested, the other two films from the same period in time, J Heller's "Catch-22" and the legendary Kubrick farce "Dr Strangelove"!)
KV's rage is well founded, he was IN Dresden when the Allied planes bombed this non -strategic city back to the Stone Age in WWII.(This , along w Hiroshima a stain on the defeat of Fascism, and "haunts" us this very day.
Aside from the VERY low key presentation of his outrage at War in general, there are TOO many side splitting moments of laughter.
My favorite especially , is the well over the top performance from Ron Leibman as the revenge-minded crazylouco "Paul Lazzaro", and the odd look and demeanor of Michael Sacks as the hero, Billy Pilgrim is one performance so well done, hard to imagine anyone else could have been so appropriate for the role.
It does not hurt to see the lovely vision of Valerie Perrine in the classic "sexy kitten" role, a pleasure for the eyes.
The artist (KV) transcends the majority "sheep-like" knee jerk approval/ambivalence to the horrors of war, hopefully the message is not lost. In both the book and the film, paradox is that the message is delivered with such grand humor!
Over the moon, a million stars, a must see film , my cliché for the day!
Joseph Heller's novel was one of the seminal literary events of the 1960s, but Mike Nichols's film ultimately proved too literal in its attempt to bring Heller's fragmented fiction to the screen. Still, Nichols, who made this on the heels of The Graduate, seemed the ideal candidate to tackle this Buck Henry adaptation. The story deals with bomber pilot Yossarian (Alan Arkin), who has flown enough missions to get out of World War II but can't because the number of missions needed for discharge keeps getting raised. The satire and absurdity of Heller's book get lost in Nichols's effort to give screen time to the members of his all-star cast, which includes Orson Welles, Jon Voight, Bob Newhart, Anthony Perkins, Richard Benjamin, and Martin Sheen, among others. --Marshall FineMore Info about this DVD Actor(s): Alan Arkin - Martin Balsam Director(s): Mike Nichols DVD Release Date: Released the 22 May 2001 Usually ships in 24 hours
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The third movie from director Keith Gordon (The Chocolate War, A Midnight Clear). The 35-year-old director who started as an actor (Christine) has turned into one of the more assured directors working today. His films are ambitious in plot and tone. With Mother Night he works with his first major star, Nick Nolte.
In 1961, the fictitious Howard W. Campbell Jr., an American by birth, shares the same deserted prison with Adolph Eichmann. As he prepares to stand trial for war crimes, the former playwright scribes his memoirs. Now this is the same Howard W. Campbell Jr. who was a notorious voice on German radio during the war, tearing into American policy and spreading Nazi propaganda. Was he a willful participant or an American spy? Campbell, who... More Info about this DVD Actor(s): Nick Nolte - Sheryl Lee Director(s): Keith Gordon DVD Release Date: Released the 22 August 2000 Usually ships within 24 hours
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Director Alan Rudolph's adaptation of Kurt Vonnegut's novel Breakfast of Champions centers on suicidal car dealer Dwayne Hoover (Bruce Willis), his drug- and television-addled wife Celia (Barbara Hershey), his cross-dressing sales manager Harry (Nick Nolte), his dim secretary and mistress Francine (Glenne Headly), and Vonnegut's alter ego of sorts, pulp writer Kilgore Trout (Albert Finney). Dwayne is desperate for meaning in his life and starts to believe that Trout, who has been invited to the town's impending arts festival, will be able to tell him some truth he's never heard before. The EPA is investigating toxic sludge under property Dwayne owns, Celia is losing her already fragile grip on reality, Harry is growing increasingly paranoid that Dwayne knows about his private... More Info about this DVD Actor(s): Bruce Willis - Albert Finney - Nick Nolte Director(s): Alan Rudolph DVD Release Date: Released the 30 June 2000 Usually ships in 24 hours
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The classic science fiction novel by Ray Bradbury was a curious choice for one of the leading directors of the French New Wave, François Truffaut. But from the opening credits onward (spoken, not written on screen), Truffaut takes Bradbury's fascinating premise and makes it his own. The futuristic society depicted in Fahrenheit 451 is a culture without books. Firemen still race around in red trucks and wear helmets, but their job is to start fires: they ferret out forbidden stashes of books, douse them with gasoline, and make public bonfires. Oskar Werner, the star of Truffaut's Jules and Jim, plays a fireman named Montag, whose exposure to David Copperfield wakens an instinct toward reading and individual thought. (That's why books are banned--they give people... More Info about this DVD Actor(s): Oskar Werner - Julie Christie Director(s): François Truffaut DVD Release Date: Released the 01 April 2003 Usually ships in 24 hours
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