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Performance (1970)
See them all in a film about fantasy. And reality. Vice. And versa.

In underworld terms, Chas Devlin is a 'performer,' a gangster with a talent for violence and intimidation. Turner is a reclusive rock superstar. When Chas and Turner meet, their worlds collide—and the impact is both exotic and explosive.

Yoko Koko retrospect, we completely ignore key tipping points, because they become accepted horizons behind us. Only if you are there, or have an insightful observer can you even capture the notion that something radical is going on. An extra bite of toast here, a...


Published January 21, 2024
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Be Glad… (1970)
Filmmaker(s): Peter Neal

Be Glad for the Song Has No Ending is the eighth album by the Incredible String Band, featuring Mike Heron, Robin Williamson, Licorice McKechnie and Rose Simpson. It is the soundtrack for a film of the same name, and was released on Island Records in March 1971, failing to chart in either the UK or US. It would be the first album from the band on the Island label and the last to feature Joe Boyd as the producer.

Woven Tongues encountered one of those popular psychology ideas recently, the one that says that the music that was on the radio when you were 13 determines your taste in music. I supposed it could be true. I have a deeply sculpted life in cinema but...


Published February 10, 2024
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Alice in Acidland (1969)
This is NO fairytale!
Filmmaker(s): Donn Greer

Cute and perky college student Alice is invited to a "pool party" by Freida, a female teacher who is actually a lesbian and has designs on Alice. At the party Alice gets drunk, takes acid and immediately becomes a lesbian, taking a bath with Freida. Later Alice gets mixed up with LSD-addicted hippies, rape, more lesbians, more LSD, orgies, suicide, and having sex with guys in boxers.

Showing the Unshowable the root, the filmmakers dilemma has two fangs. One challenge is to take things that people know and bend and filter them in ways that can be seen as “natural” when it gets to the other side, past the set, the film,...


Published November 30, 2022
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Fellini: A Director’s Notebook (1969)
Filmmaker(s): Federico Fellini

Fellini discusses his views of making motion pictures and his unorthodox procedures. He seeks inspiration in various out of the way places. During this film viewers go with him to the Colisseum at night, on a subway ride past Roman ruins, to the Appian Way, to a slaughterhouse, and on a visit to Marcello Mastroianni's house. Fellini also is seen in his own office interviewing a series of unusual characters seeking work or his help.

9 1/2 Including Seven Civilisations for myself, this is the most rewarding Fellini experience I have had. That's because in his early work, where one takes risks, he was very less ambitious narrative-wise than his later work. But then when he got to the later...


Published December 11, 2024
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Barbarella (1968)
See Barbarella do her thing!
Filmmaker(s): Roger Vadim

In the far future, a highly sexual woman is tasked with finding and stopping the evil Durand-Durand. Along the way she encounters various unusual people.

Which Skin? are only a few films that can be called roots. 1968 generated two of them, “2001” and this. “2001” is about the ambiguities of who is narrating. This is about the ambiguities of where the skin is. From the very beginning, the prurient...


Published May 16, 2023
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The Man Without a Map (1968)
Filmmaker(s): Hiroshi Teshigahara

A private detective is hired to find a missing man by his wife. While his search is unsuccessful, the detective's own life begins to resemble the man for whom he is searching.

Life as Navigation has an anchor when they enter a film. With a little exposure to world cinema, that anchor for each film is rooted in the tradition you select from that culture. This is a personal choice, made long before you encounter the film....


Published September 30, 2022
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Nanami: The Inferno of First Love (1968)
What happens to innocence in the inferno of first love?
Filmmaker(s): Susumu Hani

A teenage goldsmith with a dark past tragically falls in love with a young nude model.

Fluid Abstraction may find this hard to see. It is a Japanese “new wave”, film. It has a story of course, but such things are largely irrelevant. I’ll give it because you may not see it. (In my comments, I assume most folks have seen...


Published July 3, 2022
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Death by Hanging (1968)
Filmmaker(s): Nagisa Ōshima

A Korean man is sentenced to death in Japan but somehow survives his execution, sending the authorities into a panic about what to do next.

Film as Execution of the benefits of writing film comments is that readers will sometimes send me recommendations. If that were the only benefit, and if this were the only recommendation I would get, it would be worth it. By reading the comments, you may think...


Published December 10, 2024
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2001: A Space Odyssey (1968)
The ultimate trip.
Filmmaker(s): Stanley Kubrick

Humanity finds a mysterious object buried beneath the lunar surface and sets off to find its origins with the help of HAL 9000, the world's most advanced super computer.

Dueling Gods the disaster of ‘Sparticus.' Kubrick has centred each project on the mysteries of the narrative. Each film explores some theory or notion about the paths of storytelling and the fragility of those paths. Some get very abstract, like’Barry Lyndon,' where identities are adopted...


Published December 11, 2024
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Murder by the Book (1967)
Filmmaker(s): Mel Damski

Mild-mannered mystery writer D. H. Mercer has become so immersed in his material that his creation, hard-boiled private eye Biff Deegan, constantly appears to him as a hallucination. Intent on getting rid of Biff, and replacing him with a more civilized detective, Mercer soon finds himself in a genuine mystery involving art fraud, murder, and a beautiful lady in peril.

Double Folds isn’t worth watching for what it is, but I count it as a notable example, more so because it is a cheap TeeVee production with low aspirations. The overall story is about art forgery. The structure is adventuresome. The story we see is written...


Published February 24, 2023
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