What I’m Seeing This Week: My family is still out of the country, so I’m tentatively planning on seeing a whopping three films at Cinemapolis: Kinds of Kindness (since I audibled to Longlegs last week), MaXXXine, and National Anthem.
Also in Theaters: Inside Out 2, which continues it’s run at the Regal Ithaca Mall, remains the best new movie in Ithaca that I’ve already seen. I enjoyed Thelma, a crowd pleaser starring June Squibb as a nonagenarian vigilante at Cinemapolis which also features the late Richard Roundtree in his final role, as well. In addition to everything I’m seeing this week, I’m hoping to catch Twisters at the Regal before it closes or maybe at Cornell Cinema this fall. Your best bets for repertory fare are two family-friendly films at the Regal: The NeverEnding Story, which has screenings on Sunday and Monday, and The Lion King, which is there all week.
Home Video: Like many people I’m shaken by current events. I found solace in two films I watched a few nights ago and am therefore recommending them as a double feature. The first is The Pig, a cinéma vérité-style short (50 minutes) documentary directed by Jean Eustache which is available on The Criterion Channel. Like his previous film The Virgin of Pessac, this one (which was made in 1970) seems to cry out to be read as commentary on the events of May 1968 given its proximity to them. If you’re a chef you might disagree–after all, it’s a fairly straightforward depiction of the butchering of the titular animal: we watch as it’s bled, scalded, and broken down into primal cuts, then witness the preparation of casings and stuffing of sausages. Introductory text explains that because the subjects are speaking in a local dialect, there are no subtitles, and although even non-French speakers will catch a few words they recognize like “coeur,” for the most part we’re left to our own devices to make sense of what we see. If you eat meat, you might reach for words like “timeless,” “humane,” or even “beautiful”; however, if you’re a vegetarian, it probably strikes you as barbaric. What I’m certain of is that both camps can benefit from this clear-eyed look at what exactly happens when a hog becomes “pork” which depicts an event that took place at a specific time and place, but also has happened every day around the world for generations.
I followed The Pig up with House of Usher, which was directed by the recently deceased B-movie legend Roger Corman, stars Vincent Price as Roderick Usher with a Draco Malfoy haircut, and is available on Turner Classic Movies On Demand and WatchTCM until July 25. It’s highly enjoyable for its lurid colors, overwrought performances, and nervous breakdown soundscape. Watching it when I did, I was also struck by the terms Usher uses to describe the curse which he believes afflicts his family:
This house is centuries old. It was brought here from England. And with it every evil rooted in its stones. Evil is not just a word. It is reality. Like any living thing it can be created and was created by these people. The history of the Ushers is a history of savage degradations. First in England, and then in New England. And always in this house. Always in this house. Born of evil which feels, it is no illusion. For hundreds of years, foul thoughts and foul deeds have been committed within its walls. The house itself is evil now.
Poe’s story already was a tale about original sin become self-fulfilling prophecy, but in the hands of Corman and screenwriter Richard Matheson it takes on practically geopolitical dimensions! I don’t mean to suggest that either House of Usher or The Pig offers *answers* for our current moment, but they’re both full of great questions that it would behoove ourselves to ask, most notably who are we (however you define that): pig or butcher? Roderick Usher or Mark Damon’s Philip Winthrop? Philip Winthrop or Myrna Fahey’s Madeline Usher? Or Harry Ellerbe’s Bristol, perhaps? And then, of course, what now?
Previous “Ithaca Film Journal” posts can be found here.
The Prodigal Cinephile 