sdyer@bbnccv.UUCP (Steve Dyer) (06/09/85)
The second program of the festival presented two films, the Japanese "Black Lizard" and the Italo-American "Corrupt." Both films have Crime, writ large, as their object of examination. "Black Lizard" is a Japanese comic film noir, detailing the evil exploits of the "Black Lizard" and her quest to possess the "Star of Egypt" jewel even as she finds herself falling in love with the Bogart-like detective who is trying to foil her. It is based on a stage play adapted by Yukio Mishima, who in fact appears in a cameo towards the end as one of her human dolls. This, and the general appearance of the film (go-go girls and body paint) would date it around the late 60's or early 70's. The film would be merely amusing, if not for the galvanising performance by Akihiri Maruyama, reportedly Japan's most famous female impersonator, as the "Black Lizard." This is no mere drag show: Maruyama realizes a female character as fully as any actor in the Kabuki theater, and it is his comic artistry which raises this movie to High Camp and sustains it throughout. In its melodrama and artificiality combined with its fine technical accomplishment, it approaches the best opera. "Corrupt" is a WEIRD movie, starring Harvey Keitel, the poor man's DeNiro, and John Lydon, late of the Sex Pistols. Though it was filmed in New York with English-speaking actors, it seems to have been produced by an Italian company, leading one friend of mine to remark that it was a "Spaghetti Eastern." I found it a very confusing film until I traded notes with friends outside the theater but nevertheless engrossing and surprising. Now that I've made more sense of it, it's a film I'd want to see again. Briefly, it details the rather bizarre S&M relationship which arises between Keitel, a police detective on the take, and Lydon, a self-proclaimed cop-killer. It is also about guilt and the expiation of guilt through confession (small-c). This is a complex film, certainly outside of the ordinary fare--it is no wonder that it never played much (if at all) in the US. -- /Steve Dyer {decvax,linus,ima,ihnp4}!bbncca!sdyer sdyer@bbnccv.ARPA