Hint: click on contents for more FestivaleNovember, 1998

Reviews this issue include:		Filmspotting
Elizabeth Radiance Saving Private Ryan Velvet Goldmine there's more, see the review index For the latest stuff in Festivale, check out what's new The coming attractions section has Australian release dates		Good Times at Bad Movies Nobody likes a good movie more than I do. Conversely, nobody likes a bad movie more than I do. Hudson Hawk may have made twelve dollars fifty at the box office but unless you have shares in a movie studio, who gives a curdled fluffy duck about that? If you like it, you like it. The problem comes when you encounter people who can’t tell the difference between a good movie and a bad one.

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A friend of mine who otherwise has a lot of sterling qualities, reckoned that Starship Troopers was the best movie he ever saw. I know for a fact that Sian has seen Touch of Evil and Citizen Kane and probably The Bicycle Thieves and La Dolce Vita and yet he made that inexplicable statement. Maybe the shower scene took the blood away from his cerebral cortex for a while. I know it did mine, but I seemed to recuperate faster than he did. Liking bad movies is copacetic. Thinking that they’re the best thing since Intolerance is something else. We judge the bad movies we love on totally different criteria than a film like L’Appartment to name one of my recent favourites. On my recent adventure to the USA, I picked up a lot of movies. Mostly cult things, including two of Bill Rotsler’s 1960s cinematic efforts which have to be seen to be believed. But I also picked up a copy of Touch of Evil for a ridiculously low price and felt happy the rest of the day. (Seattle is a city that is gifted with an environment that encourages happy serendipitous discovery.)

I got happiness from both cities’ purchases but the copy of Touch of Evil I treasure much more than Please Don’t Eat My Mother or Artist’s Studio Secrets. Quality films alter and enhance our lives and our lives sometimes enhance our movie watching. I saw David Mamet’s The Spanish Prisoner a couple of weeks ago. Great little puzzle film. Good acting and after this film, I want to see Steve Martin play a James Bond villain. Anyway, the movie is based around a confidence trick to steal a mysterious economic Process from a guy. The sting goes down in Central Park, New York, near the Carousel and the Navy Fountain. Having been to New York in August, and having walked in the places that Campbell Scott’s character walked, seeing those scenes just blew me away. I walked under that archway and tried to use the men’s room where Ed (Married With Children) Neill et al. steal the formula. (It was closed). Nonetheless, my real life adventures in the Big Apple increased the pleasure of cinematic ones. If for no other reason, I now love the idea of World Travel. It lets me get more for my buck in the movies. Take care, enjoy the films and don’t just watch them, read them.

Terry Frost

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