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Show Park City News I liursda) , January 27, 1983 Page B7 (Pl!IlflBlkl(BS by Rick Drough From the U.S. Film and Video Festival r " A Classic Recommended Good double-feature double-feature material Time-killer For masochists only Dark Circle Even without exploding The Bomb, we have created a situation where atomic energy is killing us quietly, insidiously. "Dark Circle" spells out this message with deadly, deliberate impact, as it surveys the effects of our dalliance with nuclear testing, atomic power plants, and manufacture of weapons. Near the Rocky Flats nuclear plant outside Denver, Den-ver, a 30-year-old plant worker, exposed to radiation, has aged overnight over-night into a heavy, languid middle-aged man, with an indentation in his head where a brain tumor has been removed. At California's Diablo Canyon plant, nestling near an earthquake fault, the experts ex-perts make voluminous technical assurances that the plant is safe. But ultimately the plant is waylaid when it's discovered a reactor was put in the wrong building an elementary elemen-tary blueprinting error. In old Army films, we see hundreds of soldiers exposed to the atomic Nevada blasts of the 1950s. In more modern times, we see nuclear-plant workers handling plutonium waste the size of gold bars. Yet, according to the film, the amount of ingested plutonium needed to kill you amounts to less than a millionth of a gram. The film loses its grip at times. It drags in tangential issues (a visit to an Hiroshima victim; military-arms military-arms pitchmen) simply because its footage on the subjects is too good. And the narration by director Judy Irvins includes self-reflections self-reflections that are more pious than powerful. . In its best moments, which are most of the time, "Dark Circle" educates its audience audi-ence with clarity, stirs its outrage quietly, and allows the victims (and fools) of the story to speak for themselves. them-selves. EatingRaoul Paul Bartel's black comedy is rich with its throwaway humor, but can't maintain a zany tone through his story about two economically-pressed squares who turn to murdering mur-dering the swingers in their midst. Paul and Mary Bland (played by Bartel and Mary Woronov) find they can finance their dream of a country restaurant ("Chez Bland") by luring sexual aegenerates to their apartment apart-ment and killing them off with the world's most lethal frying pan. (One cook is sufficient.) suf-ficient.) The two stars are a prim-crazy prim-crazy pair who crave good food and wine as much as they dislike sex. But the picture pic-ture becomes soggily sordid as it becomes apparent the Blands have no characters equally crazy to play against. Richard Beltran tries to thicken the plot as Raoul, the young Chicano thief who becomes the Bland's partner (with a novel method to dispose of the bodies) and awakens Mary's dormant sexual urges. But Bartel's script doesn't give Raoul any daffiness. The victims, too, come across just as kinky and unlikeable, and many of the murder scenes aren't funny. (Bartel has worked with the Roger Corman studios, where cheap horror moviers are often transmuted into delightful spoofs. In "Raoul," just the opposite happens-the black comedy subsides into flatly grim moments, like the killing of lecherous bank exec Buck Henry.) Susan Saiger is wonderful, however, as Doris the Dominatrix, who leads a double life as wholesome housewife and S and M queen. The movie's funniest bits are its background details-the hospital food which looks like obscene green glops, or a sex shop where slurpy, sadistic types wander around in and out of the scene. "Raoul" is loopy enough to make one hope Bartel will get his chance at another feature. The Escape Artist At last, a child actor who is memorable without being obnoxious. Griffin O'Neal, son of Ryan, gives a funny, shrewd performance as the young magician whose father was the greatest escape artist since Houdini. He is precocious he can size up a situation with a shrug of the chin but also takes his lumps like a believable adolescent. "The Escape Artist," made by Francis Coppola's troubled Zoetrope Studios, has gone through rough editing in its creation, but that doesn't diminish the charm of this wiggy movie. O'Neal constantly manages to outsmart the crazy adults around him chiefly the corrupt politicoes around a banana-boat mayor (Desi Arnaz) who is, for some odd reason, running City Hall in a Rockwellesque American town. His crazy son (Raul Julia) can't decide whether to make money off the kid's magical talents or wring his neck. Gabriel Dell and Joan Hackett also appear as the aunt and uncle who put on a mind-reading act. (The uncle un-cle gets exasperated because his wife really is psychic.) Though the movie is truncated, trun-cated, the tender, fantastic story reaches the screen pretty much in one piece. Frances If Jane Fonda had been born in an earlier era, this might have been her fate. Free-thinking 1930s movie actress Frances Farmer cracked under her personal problems, the empty-headed oppression of Hollywood glitter, glit-ter, and her inability to make a response, either socially or creatively to the hard Depression times around her. As this sim plistic but hard-hitting drama shows, she fell into drunkenness criminal arrest, and an astounding history of abuse by mental institutions. Jessica Lange gives a triumphantly gripping performance per-formance as Frances. She derives an amazing versatility ver-satility out of the individual nuances in her performancethe perform-ancethe impudent smile, for instance, or the eyes that crackle with intelligence and mad rage. Using these, she can go from a likably smug teenage girl to (at movie's end) a ravaged Frances, disoriented by the effects of a trans-orbital lobotomy. Next to Lange's complex acting, the story of her vicitimization looks like melodrama. Frances is surrounded by crass studio heads, sleazy P. R. men, megalomaniac psychiatrists, psychia-trists, and surly cops. The villains aren't very complex, Weisberg is back Master showman Tim Weisberg will appear live on stage at the Egyptian Theatre Friday and Saturday night at 8 p.m. This is Weisberg's second appearance at the Egyptian Theatre. Weisberg and his trio will perform music from his past albums including his most recent release, "Travelin' Light." Tickets for Weisberg are still available for 14, general admission, and $12 for members of the theatre. For reservations call 649-9371. f i j 1 ! ' I ' f ' ' s - 55? ill ! S f Ar I r i4t w- - ' r- S fr - - " 1 Frances (Jessica Lange) is thrown into a cell by hospital orderlies. except for Kim Stanley as Frances' stage mother, nervously ner-vously hungering for her daughter's fame. Still the story has a nerve that reminds you of those old Warner Brothers social-protest social-protest films of the Depression. Sam Shepard is as effective effec-tive as he can be even though his role is all connective tissue. He plays the loverrescuerconfidante of Frances who shows up at convenient moments to move the plot along. 2Moses Pendleton Presents Moses Pendleton Pendleton tells us in this film that he is into "mostly major motion," but that's an understatement for this young American choreographer whose dance is by turns elegantly contorted, contor-ted, vibrant, erotic and flippant. flip-pant. Director Robert Elf-strom's Elf-strom's film covers just as many moods examining Pendleton, who tries to fathom his identity on the occasion of his 33rd birthday. birth-day. He is the troubled descendant of a successful-businessman successful-businessman grandfather (dead of a heart attack), and a father who committed suicide. In lighter moments, he is also "an awfully good-spirited good-spirited guy with a twist." Most of the time, he is shown in his large Connecticut Connec-ticut mansion, where he scampers around, or stalks the halls like a compulsive wind-up toy. Despite some labored looks at his childhood, the film is . a delightful presentation of his philosophy, his dance and quicksilver moods. Vernon, Florida Like his pet-cemetery piece, "Gates of Heaven,", Enrol Morris is seeking to expose American buf-, foonery. But in his second such film, Morris shows a bit more affection for his subjects, sub-jects, the wayward eccentrics eccen-trics in the small Southern town of Vernon. The comical star of the piece is the man who pursues turkey-hunting with the intensity in-tensity of a Tibetan monk. (He's accompanied by his ever-silent partner, Snake.) He's hilarious, but also weirdly admirable in his Zen-like communion with the forest. Morris can also find a Now showing At the Holiday Village Cinemas Ator (Not rated) Forty-eight Hours Vt Six Weeks LETTERHEADS " BROW l " ' ADVERTISING PMT W U O BUSINESS CARDS BROCHURES f ORMS FLYERS LETTERHEADS POSTERS AmFPTKiMr; pans mr.OS MAIIf K TYPESETTING DESIGN ZS5P R I N T I N C 2 LETTERHEADS BUSINESS CARDS KYIkS BROr.HUKtN . W"s ADVERTISING LABELS LOGOS M All IKS HM1S IYI14 " ' FLYERS RBOHI igf ft 4 ) - 1 A IKHFAOS KM Iks MAILERS PMTS ADVER USING DESIGN IOGOS tABLIS TYPfSElIING XT XE XT Brighten lip your life with IParfi City Lighting We have available a full selection of bulbs for commercial and residential lighting Give us a call and we will be happy to have a lighting consultant talk over your lighting needs with you. Park City Lighting Stop in and see ut at our new location The Emporium 2, Hwy. 248 East P.O. Box 680095, Park City 84068 649-1900 .A X.. We Have a Better Deal! pii "r" " "now wj ON DEMAND IN STOCK GL 4XS30 Station wagon Go in the Snow with 4 wheel drive and front wheel drive! Selection Parts Financing Service Leasing SUBARU op MURRAY 5300 South State, Murray OfS) OfcxfcA Ooen Late 0Z--00 character an old man in a skiff reflecting on God who doesn't provoke laughter at all. But Vernon also swarms with weirdoes. One old man offers reflections that swing from the profound to the bigoted, and he is full of half-cocked half-cocked expertise. (He has a jeweler's eyeglass, but doesn't know what the hell to look for with it.) The local minister goes nit-picking through the Bible in search of a topic for a Sunday sermon. ser-mon. His theme, it turns out, is a Noah Websterish paen to the Biblical word "Therefore." Morris also includes in-cludes a hilariously unexplained unex-plained image a roving truck with exhaust pipe that spews out a huge cloud of i white smoke; Despite' Morris' tendency to sneer at his subjects, his alienfamiliar presentation of Americana is still memorable. Experience Unique Dining Join us in the Patio Greenhouse for Breakfast, Lunch or Dinner. Featuring Park City's Most Original Menu. Enjoy homemade soups, sandwich creations and our famous breakfast specialties, as well as reasonably priced steak, chicken and seafood entrees that include our fresh salad bar. Open every day 8:00 a.m. -10:00 p.m. Dinner Entrees available 5:00 p.m. -10:00 p.m. We will not be serving dinner Jan. 10th - Jan. 13th ESTABLK 3 17 MAIN STREET PARK CITY VISA & MASTER CHARGE 649-8284 Bob Weisenfeld Classical guitar player Tuesday and Thursday evenings IB 'it f- 111 r S 1 1 X. 1? U 4 h Q"- t iff The Quiet World.of S3 Where the Little Things Are the Big Things ... US Little things like - Bubbling Streams Architectural Control Wooded Lots Underground Utilities Breathtaking Views 20 Minutes from Salt Lake Reasonable Prices 10 Minutes from Park City Estate lots Vi acre plus, good financing available. Prices start at $30,000. Look for the signs and log sales office, Open Seven Days a Week. 7 IRTHLIN 649-7930 521-5386 J |