chosen by Joshua Wiebe of Octopus Cinema

For 10,000 they break your arms. For 20,000 they break your legs. Axel Freed owes 44,000.

Where to begin? I came to this film with low expectations; its this feeling, the two phrases: JAMES CAAN and 1974 do not register well with one’s idea of a good movie. However, this Dostoyevskian based thriller is highly intelligent and perhaps too much so for its own good.      The Gambler is written by James Toback, produced by Winkler-Chartoff, and directed by Karel Reisz. In The Gambler we follow James Caan as Axel Freed, professor and playboy, whose quest to “extend the juice” is met with ill consequences, as he finds himself scrounging the streets of New York City and beyond to pay his debt: 44,000. Freed is a man of two personalities. He’s an English professor teaching the principles set down by Dostoyevsky, that in many ways mirror his gambling addiction. Freed’s compulsive attitudes leave him estranged from his loved ones, particularly Lauren Hutton; and family, threaten his career, yet he can’t take the easy way out and insists that’ll he will be fine. Freed describes his fascination for and tendency to provoke risk, how it satisfies him to live dangerously, as with most playboys attaining Freed’s outlook on life, they’ll play dangerously until they loose. Axel Freed is an addict, to gambling, as many of us are; we all have our addictions and desires. It is a clear morality tale where our hero wins but at a cost. I can see why my fellow “cineaste” chose this picture for the month of June, and I support their opinion that this a lost gem of the 1970s. Is it fair to say this film was ahead of its time? No, that’s not what I’m trying to say. Simply, 1971-1975 was a time where gutsy action-packed blockbusters drew in the most crowds. It was released to an audience that wasn’t interested. The public sought fun, exciting, inexpensive thrills, which clearly is not what The Gambler has to offer. It is fantastic and intelligent in its own right, and very under-appreciated, as is its riveting score; based on Symphony No.1 by Gustav Mahler and composed by Jerry Fielding. This film was a failure in the commercial market, perhaps in more reasons than just it’s contents alone.           For one thing, the only advertisement I can find for it, is the original poster: http://www.moviegoods.com/movie_poster/the_gambler_1974.htm

I do however believe that, had it been made now, despite the inevitable public cravings for action-packed trash, it would be received well by critics and audiences alike, and would maintain a much better reputation than this old relic does now.

The Doctor’s Diagnosis: *** out of 5 stars. 

“Be prepared…to live the most wonderful experience of your life”, says the preview for the film that was shown at The Elgin at midnight, premiering December 17, 1970 and running through to June of the following year; making it a true midnight movie if there ever was one.  This film has influenced figures in the entertainment business such as David Lynch; clearly, Samuel Fuller, Dennis Hopper, Bob Dylan, Marilyn Manson, Peter Gabriel, John Lennon, and etc. The tagline comes very close to reality, or whatever is left of it in El Topo. Alejandro Jodorowsky directs the film and plays its title role. Now, to understand the allegory present in the film’s two hours and five minutes you must construe the narrative, or whatever fragments of the narrative by the end of the picture. Really, it’s already construed for you, in a literal sense, though viewers will have to take note of its religious implications to understand it. An L.S.D. trip without the acid, as it is regarded. That being said, El Topo is a mystic film, blanketed with Christian symbolism and Eastern philosophies that combat El Topo in his quest for enlightenment. The film is very disarming and difficult to follow, though it is told in four segments: GENESIS, PROPHETS, PSALMS, and APOCALYPSE. Its really a two part film. The first half intriguing to watch, as we see El Topo set out to defeat the four gunman of the desert, and he succeeds in doing so, but at quite a cost. The second half is his journey to redemption among a clan of cave-dwelling, deformed outcasts, where our “hero” frees his new found family, he is reunited with his son; now grown and suffering under his father’s shame, much to his own undoing, and tragically does not succeed in the wake of a massacre committed by the cultist residents of the area. El Topo has lost and no one but him is at fault, he then engages in a ritual of self-immolation; as is the viewer hasn’t seen enough hateful bloodshed already. I do think that in the second half Jodorowsky touches down on racism by creating a satire on the prejudices in the American society. It certainly takes note of  slavery that existed in “the old west” and the further treatment of other races as unequals. Being an American myself, I see what the idea is, and it still has value in today’s world. Racism is still abroad, and it always will be. That thrown in with Jodorowsky’s “quest for enlightenment, make it a truly ingenious picture, that hits home and at the same time takes you where you’ve never been, somewhere you never want to go, where…

The mole digs tunnels under the earth, looking for the sun. Sometimes, he gets to the surface. When he sees the sun he is blinded.

The Doctor’s Diagnosis: *** out of 5 stars.

                                STARRING Charlton Heston, Anthony Zerbe, and Rosalind Cash

Post No.1

The Omega Man may be the very best, or the very worst adaptation of Richard Matheson’s groundbreaking novel I Am Legend. The bloodthirsty script, written by John William and Joyce Cooper Corrington, begins presenting a germ warfare in a very fashionable style, through flashbacks. The first thirty minutes of the film are excellent. We’re introduced to Heston, who brilliantly portrays Matheson’s loud-mouthed last man on earth; Col. Robert Neville. He clearly understands Neville’s loneliness and loss of touch with reality. By the way, the best scene in this crude little movie is when Neville screens Woodstock in the abandoned theater. It’s really the only scene in the film that really conveys any strong sense of feeling, emotion. No other moment really hits the mark as that one does there. After this brief period of excellence, the picture is utterly ruined when we’re introduced to Anthony Zerbe and his Manson family parallel of pale faced, blonde “afroed’, mutants wearing polarized shades. “The Family” isn’t even laughable, it’s just a real shame and a letdown to what could have been a great picture. The tragedy of it all is, that just into this good film the plot collapses with its transition between the graveness of the flashback sequences and the silly episodes involving “The Family” and their quest to kill Neville and “cleanse” the world. I just don’t buy it. It would be a little unsettling to see these “mutants”, who look like Satanists out of a poor budgeted giallo thriller, hurtling fireballs at your window. Rosalind Cash, Paul Koslo, Eric Laneuville, and the orphans offer cute performances, but nothing special. “Are you god?” Jill Giraldi asks Neville. No he’s not god dear, he’s Charlton Heston in the weakest film of his career, which he happens to be proud of, our happened to be proud of; rest in peace you old horse. The weak plot and character development are what destroy this film; the dialogue varies from highly original to terrible. Let’s face it; The Omega Man is a bad movie. A very bad movie, though I do appreciate it’s political/ cultural/ spiritual undertones and demonic exploitation of the Manson family. After all, aren’t those the bearings of a cult classic?                              The Doctor’s Diagnosis:  ** out of 5 stars.