Friday, June 4 1976 THE MICHIGA
H ppenings
AN DAILY
Page Five
This week's HAPPENINGS
fim reviews were written by
Kim Potter
All week long
COMMERCIAL CINEMA
The Missouri Breaks - (The
Movies, Briarwood)-The super-
star pairing of Jack Nicholson
as a noble outlaw and Marlon
Brando as a psychotic killer
hired to track him down is
about the only thing this mud-
died, meandering Western has
going for it, and it's not enough.
Director Arthur Penn presents
us with a series of stunningly
gorgeous visuals and then pro-
ceeds to do absolutely nothing
with them; the film just ram-
bles along, often incoherently
and never compellingly-a pis-
tache about one third Altman,
one third Peckinpah, and three
thirds tedium. Brando's deter-
minedly weird portrayal of the
brittiant, half-mad "regulator"
provides some sparks of life to
the stillborn proceedings, but
his characterization has rela-
tiv e little to do with the gen-
er tone of the film and seems
more an exercise in self-indul-
gence; and the script provides
precious few scenes for he and
Nicholson to play against each
other. Saddest of all is the bor-
decline hack job turned in by
Atrthr Penn - once considered
the brightest and most original
of American directors, but now
seemingly lost and wandering
in an artistic wilderness not
eien his own. * *
Etmbryo-(The Movies, Briar-
wood i - Experimenting doctor
(ROw Hudson) injects growth
hormones in an effort to save
a premature fetus, finds himself
with a full-grown woman barely
a moth later. A thoroughly bi-
zarre premise which combines
elements of Frankenstein, Pyg-
malion and Charly, but' which
emerges as a surprisingly intel-
ligent, well-made horror-sci-fi
concoction. Embyro gets drag-
ged down by a too-grizzly cli-
max apparently required for the
film s natural popcorn crowd,
but by and large maintains a
literate, low-key pace refresh-
ingly different from the rag-tag
productions that dominate the
horror g e n r e. Hudson fares
passably as the ill-starred re-
searcher, but Embyro is domi-
nated by newcomer Barbara
Carrera with an astonishingly
moving, sensitive portrayal of
a child - adult thrust into a
strange universe she can intel-
lectually but not emotionally
comprehend. Embryo is hardly
for everyone's taste, but for
sci-fi fans starved by cinematic
stupidity, it will prove an unex-
pected treat. * .*
Mother, Jugs and Speed -
(Michigan-An initially prom-
ising but ultimately shabby film
about the daily lives of ambu-
lance emergency teams, focus-
ing nn the three little characters
(Bill Cosby, Harvey Keitel and
Raquel Welch). It begins as a
reasonably sober look at the
grueling, often seedy routine of
emergency squads, but the film
starts to fall apart about half-
way through jumping grotes-
BILLIARDS
is the No. 1 game
at the UNION
quely from farce to tragedy and
back again with no evident at-
tention whatever to previous
plot or character progresison.
Cosby and Keitel do what they
can with the material provided
them, but prove helpless against
the stony thespian incompetence
of Raquel Welch plus the gen-
eral nonsensity of the initially
serious story. Mother, Jugs and
Speed is a shoddy make-a-fast-
buck filmmaking, and the fact
that it could have been a good
movie only makes it all the
more unforgivable. The most
avoidable offering of the week.*
All the President's Men-(The
Movies, Briarwood)-This splen-
did film proves less a specific
chronicle of Nixon's downfall
than a precise and remarkably
absorbing look at the painstak-
ing journalistic detective work
that undid him-and in the pro-
cess probably saved us a na-
tion. * * * *
Follow Me, Boys! -(State)-
Typical Disney drivel - as al-
ways, a delight for the kids, an
agony for the parents. *
Story of 0 - (Campus)-This
French cinemazation of the fam-
ous porno bestseller waters
down the domination .tone and
much of the violence of the
whips-and-chains novel it was
b a s e d on, emerging as a
splashy, gauzey love story that
suffers not so much from moral
depravity as from dullness. The
gorgeous Corrine Clary gives an
adroit performance as the kinky
heroine, but Story of 0 deserves
its X rating about as much as
Follow Me, Boys! * *
Friday
CINEMA
King Rat -- (Cinema Guild,
Men's WEEKEND
Interpersonal
workshop/camoout
JUNE 18, 19, 20
(slidino scale feel
CONTACT: Richard Kemp-
ter, 995-0088 & rleove men-
sage, or Michael Andes at
662-2801.
snonsored by:
Lifework Counselino
Arch. Aud., 7:30 &
of the manipula
American wheeler-
(George Segal) ina
ish - populated Jal
camp. Long, episo
hard to follow, the
f r o m fine perf
George Segal and
supporting cast. 1
ing as a character
a sequential dram,
Tom Jones-(Cin
Aud. A, 7:30 & 9:3
the movies' New
lightenment cann
lustre of this ribald
the Fielding nove
unponpous reverse
Barry Lyndon, and
of the bawdiest
films ever made.'
King of Hearts -
Film Co-op, MLB
Back at last, e
starved Ann Arbor
umphal return following a pro- Mickey Moose and many other
tracted absence dating way star-studded luminaries.
back to April! Better catch it The B 1 a c k Cat - (Cinema
now, 'cause it won't appear Guild, Arch. Aud., 7:30 & 9:30)
gF again for a whole month (sob). -Satanic goings-on in Boris
* * Karloff's sinister castle. Early
The Fearless Vampire Killers horror film which has nothing
(Ann Arbor Film Co-op, MLB at all to do with the Poe short
9:3)-Story 4, 7 & 10:30)-Roman Polan- story of the same name, but
tions of an ski's horror satire was roasted contains some nice stylization
dealer soldier to death by critics in 1967, is and some reasonable thrills.
a mostly Brit- now championed by cultists as * * '
panese POW a surrealist - expressionist clas- An Afternoon of Looney Tunes
dic and often sic. Actually, it's neither as -(People's Bicentennial Com-
film benefits good or bad as all that, but is mission, MLB 3, 1, 2:30 & 4)-
ormances by reaosnably well-made and di- Bugs, Porky, Elmer, Daffy and
an excellent verting. * * all of Warner Bros. greatest.
tore interest-
study than as Premature Burial-(Ann Ar-
a. * * * bor Film Co-op, MLB 4, 9 only)
ama It, Ag. -Poe's famous thriller as seen
0)-Time and through the low-budget eyes of CINEMA
Age of En- Roger Corman, and, consider- Scarface - (Cinema Guild,
ot dim the ing the production handicaps, Guild, Arch. Aud., 8 only).-One
d classic from not bad at all. * * a of the immortal triumvirate of
I. A kind of early '30's gangster films, along
e reflection of with Cagney's Public Enemy
d remains one ZOurOav and Robinson's Little Ceasar.
and funniest Howard Hughes sat on the
* * * CINEMA rights to this picture for years
- (Ann Arbor Animation Night-(Cinema It, following its initial release, and
3, 7 & 9)- Ang. Aud. A, 7:30 & 9)--A mini- only recently has it been avail-
entertainment- history of the American Car- able again for public showing,
ites! In a tri- toon, featuring Bugs Bunny, See HAPPENINGS, Page 10
Po 0.E. . S (
at
JL
2800 Jackson Road
Q. -
WALTER DYER
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