directed by Donald Cammell
UK 1987

Late director Donald Cammell's haunting formalistic approach to formulaic material, written by Cammell and his wife China (adapted from the Margaret Tracy novel Mrs. White), elevates what could have been routine '80s trash into that hazy realm of the art film. David Keith stars as Paul White, an audio installation expert whose idyllic life with his wife (Cathy Moriarty, as good as ever) and young daughter (Danielle Smith) is threatened when he finds himself the subject of an investigation into a string of local serial killings. While the first hour is too preoccupied with backstory and apparent minutiae to generate much suspense, attention is maintained by Cammell's often exhilarating stylization, which finishes the film's surface with a very late-1980s consumerist gloss. The movie frequently has the look and feel of a calculatedly "sexy" television commercial, which interacts perversely with the immensely creepy and sexually sadistic nature of the murders, which are filmed in the icy, yet spectacular manner of a Dario Argento film. Also in common with Argento is the usage of POV perspective in the murder scenes, employed to preserve the anonymity of the killer while underscoring the viewer's role as voyeur; here, it is done uncommonly well, as these scenes are uncomfortably voyeuristic in the extreme. Donald Cammell, a Brit (whose debut was as co-director of Performance, with Nicolas Roeg, whose own style is very evident in White of the Eye), brings an outsider's perspective to the Tucson, Arizona seen here. Like Jacques Demy with Model Shop, Antonioni with Zabriskie Point, and Wim Wenders with The End of Violence and Paris, Texas, Cammell is a European looking at a contemporary western region of the United States with an alien eye, revealing an imposing strangeness by rendering its natural and architectural landscapes cold, foreboding, and oppressively open, echoing the spiritual emptiness of a materialistic culture.

In its last third, the film briefly becomes quite horrifying and effective as a thriller before disintegrating into a daffy stalk-and-slash climax that doesn't seem to know where to go or how to conclude. Prior to this point, there emerges some interesting notions about regular sex within a domestic partnership, recalling Sam Fuller's The Naked Kiss. Alberta Watson is good as a neglected housewife with whom Keith's character is engaged in an affair, and Danielle Smith is an uneasy and fascinating presence in the role of Keith and Moriarty's daughter.

Paul Haynes

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Theatrical Release: May 20, 1988

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DVD Review: Hollywood Classics Ltd. / Mælström - Region 2 - PAL

Comments

A serviceable release under the Dutch label Mælström, this is the barest of bare-bones editions, with no supplements whatsoever. However, having an anamorphic, dual-layer edition of this rather obscure title on DVD is a small cause for celebration. There's nothing wrong with the transfer itself, which is progressive and evidences few apparent artifacts. The print shows some minor wear that's really too negligible to infringe upon viewing enjoyment, and though there's heavy grain throughout the presentation, Janet Maslin's New York Times review of the film, written at the time of its original theatrical release, refers to the "grainy, high-contrast style" of the flashback scenes, which "is meant to look very different from the rest of the film," according to Maslin, "but does not." Given this, it's reasonable to conclude that the image on this disc is a pretty faithful representation of the way the film originally looked. out of  - Paul Haynes

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