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Show Park Record Thursday, May 29, 1986 Page B7 watered down Shepard play to screen Robert Altman's 'Fool for Love' brings Fool for Love 2PoltergeistH It was a good idea to bring playwright Sam Shepard to the screen, but "Fool" wasn't the right choice from his works. The film shows all the elements that have made Shepard a distinctive, controversial con-troversial artist, but it's diluted stuff. Shepard himself stars as a rambling rambl-ing rodeo rider, who finds an old love (Kim Basinger) at a grubby little motel that sits in a semicircle by a Southwestern highway. (At night, it looks like it's floating in a black hole.) The couple's hate-love-hate relationship rela-tionship looks like a familiar story-he liked the road too much, and she got tired of waiting for him. But there's more to it in the Weird West Show pictured here. Shepard's cowboy, Eddie, goes into Gary Cooper-like silences, but he's also crazy. He taunts, crashes though doors or leaps on his horse and whirls his lariat (though there's nothing to lasso but a garbage can). Or he just gets disgusted. Basinger, as May, is scared of him. Or attracted to him. Or she wants to slit him open. Or she just gets disgusted. The two of them are observed by the old man (Harry Dean Stanton) who lives nearby in a trailer. The old man keeps an empty frame, and says it's a picture of Barbara Man-drell. Man-drell. He's married to her in his mind, he says. Director Robert Altman circles around this seedy little oasis, observing obser-ving the characters' maneuverings, their glances and compulsions. There is a strange, compelling thread connecting all three characters. But "Fool" is so unbalanced, un-balanced, you might leave the theater before you find out what the connection is. The first two-thirds of the picture is all mystery and murkiness. It's Quickies by Hick Brough Now Showing At the Holiday Village Cinemas: Cobra (not yet rated) The Money Pit 'Poltergeist II 1 enigmatic hints, brooding silences and unexplained fury and despair. The last third is all explanation. May's date, a stranger (Randy Quaid), arrives and the other three characters reveal their odd "family" "fami-ly" relationship to him, and us. (Quaid plays his character as lum-pishly lum-pishly receptive.) The film is well-acted and directed. Altman makes good use of one recurrinng oddity. The characters narrate episodes of their past life, but the flashbacks of the episodes don't match what they're telling. Sometimes the conflicts involve in-volve unimportant details. Are the characters willfully lying, or just not remembering right? The two parts of "Fool For Love" don't come together right. For a better bet-ter example of Shepard on screen, look at "Paris, Texas." VzUforia In American movies today, weir-does weir-does concentrate in two places: either the bohemian neighborhoods of big cities ("After Hours") or small towns in the Western desert. "Uforia" settles on the latter. Fred Ward is a scruffy traveling con-man who fancies that behind his travel dust, he's a Waylon Jennings lookalike. He lands in a small town where an unscrupulous preacher (Harry Dean Stanton) ministers to the faithful, and also sells them "hot" cars transported across state lines. The local grocery clerk (Cindy Williams) believes in UFOs and says Adam and Eve were astronauts. Another clerk believes he was predestined to work in the Express Line. He was all set to take another job, and then, "I felt this pull over to Sells-Rite," he says. The movie hopes you will laugh at these people at first, and then find it appealing that, in this age, they at least believe in something. This message is stated often enough in the dialogue but you never believe it. Williams, her fellow UFOlogists and other believers just look silly, not endearing. The picture also doesn't convince you to like Ward, the opportunist who falls for Williams in spite of himself. (He helps her when she predicts space people are going to land on a hilltop near town.) Ward can play a roguish softy, but he looks awkward doing it here, for some reason. Even Harry Dean Stanton gives one of his more routine performances. perfor-mances. "Uforia" encourages you too much to laugh at its characters, but it has a few comical touches. (Preacher Stanton, trying to exploit the alien landings, has his choir wear Martian antennas. ) Note: Some of the offbeat pictures this week don't succeed, but Plitt Theatres deserves credit. In the midst of the silly-movie season this summer, Plitt is hosting pictures like the above, plus E. M. Forster's "Room With a View" and Fellini's "Fred and Ginger." Waylon Jennings will join Willie Nelson in a concert at ParkWest Ski Area on June 6. Krokus cancels, Willie, Waylon set at ParkWest The summer concert series at ParkWest Ski Area will kick off on Friday, June 6, at 7:30 p.m. with the outlaw country singers Willie Nelson and Waylon Jennings. United Concerts annnounced last week that its "School's Out" concert at ParkWest, featuring Krokus, has been postponed. Listed below are the eight other concerts scheduled to date: June 27 Kenny Loggins June 30 Joe Jackson July 4 Depeche Mode July 19 Beach Boys Aug. 8 Jimmy Buffett Aug. 9Billy Ocean Aug. 13 Eurythmics Aug. 15 Grateful Dead The series is also sponsored by Pepsi and PM Magazine Utah. Tickets, from $13.25 to $17.25, are available at Datatix outlets and ParkWest Ski Area. FRENCH CONTINENTAL CUISINE We'w Open Wot Dinner GREAT NEW MENU 6 p.m.- 9 p.m. Closed Wednesdays Alex's Patio 0?w,o for lunch Corkage and Set-Ups Available 442 Main St. Downstairs 649-6644 They're back. And this is about as good as a sequel can be. The beleaguered family of "Poltergeist" moves to another town, but unearthly events follow them. A wicked preacher who led his band of believers to their deaths wants the vitality of Carol Ann (Heather O'Roarke ) the little girl with ESP. From his between-life-and-death world he pursues her. Only the family's love can protect her. The father (Craig T. Nelson) and mother (Jobeth Williams) must overcome the sly tactics of the preacher, who means to divide them and take Carol Ann. There's a lovely performance by Geraldine Fitzgerald as the grandmother grand-mother who dies and returns as an angel. And Tangine, the minute medium of "Poltergeist," returns, this time with a humorous Indian medicine man, to bring the family through the crisis. Special effects abound. The preacher enters the worm in the bottom bot-tom of a tequila bottle. The father takes a drink and swallows the worm. Later he vomits and the worm, now "the beast," balloons slimily from the father's mouth and crawls away. Get a good grip on your seat. "Poltergeist II" is satisfyingly scary. And sweetly uplifting kind of a non-preachy "Father Knows Best" meets "Exorcist." A Classic Recommended Good double feature material Time-killer For masochists only vrar J Sailboard Swap May 31 & June 1 ScrvicQmastor World's Largest Professional Cleaning Organization. Full range of cleaning services for condos, homes and offices. Specializing in: carpets, upholstered furniture, walls, floors, windows and restoration. 654-2018 Mountain Valley Maintenance Call us for your cleaning needs: Condo, Home, Office Cleaning 649-2370 We are reliable. B&H Services Cleaning & Maintenance Home - Condo Business Window Washing Licensed & Insured 649-0S48 (mm Bush Gardens For all your yard maintenance needs -MOWING -FERTILIZING -WEEDING -SPRAYING For estimates call 649-6167 Sii you would like to be hstea in om Home Services, just call 649-9014. ff MIL MOT Ml JUJ W F F LOCAL QUICK PRINT PRICES COMPARE OUR PRICES AND SAVE! 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