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From: oscar@utcsrgv.UUCP (Oscar M. Nierstrasz)
Newsgroups: net.movies
Subject: FESTIVAL OF FESTIVALS (2 of 3)
Message-ID: <27@utcsrgv.UUCP>
Date: Sun, 23-Sep-84 16:59:50 EDT
Article-I.D.: utcsrgv.27
Posted: Sun Sep 23 16:59:50 1984
Date-Received: Sun, 23-Sep-84 17:23:12 EDT
Organization: CSRI, University of Toronto
Lines: 90

(more capsule summaries ...)

Notre Histoire  (Blier, Bertrand; France; 1984; 111m)
	Entertaining, but overlong comedy about a man who meets his
	ideal woman.  Lots of boxes within boxes, dreams within dreams
	and fantasies within fantasies.  (Nathalie Baye is gorgeous as
	ever.)

Funny Dirty Little War  (Olivera, Hector; Argentina; 1983; 80m)
	A satire about a mini-revolution staged in a small town in
	Argentina.  The movie vacillates between slapstick and serious
	commentary.  Though North Americans will probably have trouble
	catching all the references, its message is clear.  At the same
	time, the film has the virtue of not lecturing us.

Voyage, Le  (Andrieu, Michel; France; 1984; 100m)
	More nihilist fantasies from directors with nothing to say.  A
	drug-pusher is blackmailed into smuggling explosives into
	Egypt.  His girlfriend accompanies him, without knowing at
	first the real reason for the trip.  Though the whole affair is
	shrouded with vagueness and mystery, the film's ending is as
	inevitable as it is pointless.

Outback  (Kotcheff, Ted; Australia; 1970; 105m)
	A school-teacher in Australia's outback gets stranded in a
	small town when he loses his savings in a gambling game.  From
	there, things go downhill.  A downer, but a fabulously
	well-made (and virtually unknown) film.  Donald Pleasance plays
	an alcoholic doctor who befriends the school-teacher.

Skip Tracer  (Dalen, Zale R.; Canada; 1977; 94m)
	A character study of a `repo man' for a loan company.  Despite
	the film's incredibly low budget (it looks like it was shot in
	Super 8), the lead's acting is strong enough to make this movie
	interesting from start to finish.  Shot in Vancouver.

Full Moon in Paris  (Rohmer, Eric; France; 1984; 100m)
	Another talkerama from Eric Rohmer (My Night at Maude's,
	Claire's Knee, Pauline at the Beach).  In this film, Louise
	tries to make the best of an unsatisfactory relationship by
	taking a second apartment in Paris, in addition to the one in
	the suburbs she shares with her boyfriend.  All the usual
	twists and turns of a Rohmer film.

Next of Kin  (Egoyan, Atom; Canada; 1984; 72m)
	An interesting low-budget film about a young man living with
	his middle-class parents, who decides to `adopt' a new family.
	He stumbles across an Armenian family who had given up their
	son for adoption when they arrived in Canada many years
	before.  He returns as their `long-lost son' ...  Not as
	bizarre as one might expect from a plot summary, but
	interesting throughout nonetheless.

Maudite Galette, La  (Arcand, Denys; Canada; 1972; 100m)
	Off-beat thriller in which there are no good guys, and all the
	bad guys get killed.

Illusionist, The  (Stelling, Jos; Netherlands; 1983; 90m)
	Truly inspired nonsense from Holland.  A ``silent'' movie
	without a word of dialogue.  The hero (and script-writer) is a
	thick-glassed overgrown boy who lives with his twin brother and
	his parents in a wind-mill.  The hero sees a magic show and
	wants to become a magician.  Everything happens, and then
	some.  An extended Salvador Dali dream-sequence.

Places in the Heart  (Benton, Robert; USA; 1984; 111m)
	Great schlock from Hollywood.  Sally Fields is a gutsy woman
	who has to make it on her own after her husband dies.  (This
	one was voted most popular film of the Festival.)

Man Without Memory  (Gloor, Kurt; Switzerland; 1984; 90m)
	One day in Switzerland the police find a man without any
	identification sitting outside a car park.  He says nothing.
	After drawing a blank card, they turn him over to a psychiatric
	institution for ``assessment''.  (Some superficial similarities
	to ``Knife in the Head''.) Fascinating.

Improper Conduct  (Almendros, Nestor; France; 1984; 115m)
	Documentary about the maltreatment of intellectuals,
	homosexuals and other ``misfits'' in Cuba.

Voro Nova  (Rijneke, Dick; Netherlands; 1984; 100m)
	Tedious plotless droning.

Salome  (Guillen, Laurice; Philippines; 1981; 105m)
	Campy melodrama about an unfaithful wife who murders a
	``rapist''.  Rashomon-like retelling of the murder gets
	ridiculous after two or three times.

more ...