UUCJEFF@ECNCDC.BITNET (jeff beer) (02/14/90)
Saw it last saturday. I definitely give it a thumbs up. Critics have complained that it is too much of a remake of Down By Law which was too much of a remake of Stranger Than Paridise. There of course are a lot of simularities, the same bleak scenes, the same low life characters, it again concerns foriegners coming to the America on the other side of the tracks. But this has some new formal devices which give the film a different approach. It presents three stories, which after watching the 2nd one, it becomes the sequence of events makes it clear that each story is happening at the same time. This creates a suspense for the 3rd story that you would have never gotten from its minimalist style by itself. Again there are some good characters. Screeming Jay Hawkins plays a hotel manager. The two Japanese tourists are a delight, and the camera work is superb. The camera work accomplishes a strange beauty in urban decay, much as Antonioni (spell) did in one of his trilogies. (cannot remember the name, but I think it had RED in the title) Jeff Beer