Saturday, April 08, 2006


golden age of VHS pt. three--White of the Eye from the late Donald ("Performance") Cammell, one of the best movies of the 80's, as scary as "The Shining" thinks it is with an infinitely more nuanced view of marriage, with career-best performances by the underrated David Keith and Cathy Moriarty--this fine essay ties it in with Cammell's difficult life--

"About two-thirds of the way through, the film's hermeneutic code is blown wide open, as Paul's loving wife Joan (Cathy Moriarity) makes a gruesome discovery: human body parts, wrapped up neatly in translucent plastic bags, hidden in a hollow space underneath the bathtub. From this point on, the dominant focalization of events is through Joan rather than Paul, who (substituting for the viewer) no longer asks, in effect, "Who committed these horrible murders?", but "Paul, how could you do this?" and "What will you do to your family now that we know you're the guilty one?" "

Still, shamefully, not out on DVD...

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