4 ARTS T4e Michigan Daily Friday, January 13, 1984 Page6 1 Subscribe to The Michigan A * Daily RUSH, KAPPA Need a ride, Call1662-0385 'Tb By Byron Bull THE PROBLEM with Michael Mann's The Keep is one inherent in so many recent films, very glossy on the surface with only a great vacuum at its heart. As a horror film, it's inex- cusably timid, in fact, it's boring to the point of being stagnant. Visually, with its diffused lighting and drab hues, it's little more than an expanded MTV video, and as intellectually challenging. Described by Mann as a "fairy tale for adults" The Keep is just a mess of con- fusing subplots, pretentious sym- bolism, and genre cliches. Mann showed great promise as a writer/director with his one previous film, Thief. But the great flair and knack for electrifying cinematics he displayed there are strangly absent. His sensibilities here are those of a rank novice, with plenty of resources at his disposal and no idea what to do with them. The Keep is part horror, part tragic love, and part allegory but with no connecting threads, and, thus, the movie feels improvised, as if directed from a handful of vague notes. Ann Arbor Civic Theater AUDITIONS "The Diviners" January 14-16; Callbacks January 18 Jan. 14 Mass Meeting and Open Auditions, 1 :30-4:3,0 p.m. Jan. 15 Open Auditions, 1:30-4:30 p.m. Jan. 16 Auditions by Appointment Only, 7:30-9:30 Roles: 7 Male, Ages 14-55 - 5 Female, Ages 16-50 Call 662-9405 for Appointment and Information Scripts Available ANN ARBOR CIVIC THEATER at AACT Offices. 338 S. Main - 662-9405 e Keei The story is an assemblage of ideas lifted from old "Night Gallery" and "Twilight Zone" episodes. It concerns a division of Nazis, in the early days of the war, assigned to secure a remote pass in the Carpathian Mountains. They settle in a small Rumanian village and set up base inside a monumental for- tress (the Keep) so old not even its caretaker knows who built it or why. Touring its labyrinth of dark halls, the garrison commander (Jurgen Prochnow) examines the thick stone walls and comments gravely, "This fortress was not designed to keep anyone out, it was designed to keep something in... That something is an ancient demon, locked within for eons until the Ger- mans accidentally release it. Called a Molasar in the credits, it is a tumultuous cloud of smoke and light that blows the heads off its victims and incinerates them, leaving cryptic but indecipherable writings in blood on the walls. Respondong to the commander's pleas for help, an S.S. attachment (in punk haircuts) arrives, and promptly executes a handful of villagers thinking they are responsible for the killings. To decipher the runes they bring in a crip- pled Jewish scholar (there's always a scholarly expert in these films) who, not so surprisingly, is accompanied by his beautiful young daughter. The scholar, played by Ian McKellen, is quickly confronted by the demon while alone. They form a Faustian pact, with McKellen regaining his youth and health in exchange for certain vague favors. Meanwhile, his daughter (Alberta Watson) meets and is quickly seduced by a stranger called Glaken (Scott Glenn) whose eyes glow green when agitated and who seems to know instinctively that the Molasar is loose. That the two end up in bed after ex- changing only a few words, is contrived to say the least. Little imagination is needed to guess that Glenn's character is the Keep's true guardian, waiting through the millenium in case the Molasar ever escapes. Their climactic battle is so brief it's literally anticlimactic. The proceedings are comic bookish in the most derogatory sense. Good and evil are defined in the same old sophomoric Christian sense of any B vampire movie. Mann lamely tries to tie together the evil of fascism and greed with that of evil incarnate but the idea never gells. He loads the film with overt symbolism. The Keep's design is a blend of mediavalism with Albert Sperrian influences, and the Molasar's final incarnation, a shiny, glistening black muscular form with glowing eyes, is the ultimate mutation of the black uniformed S.S. But because Mann can't connect the two extreme concepts of evil (human and supernatural), his symbols lack power. His fairy tale loses its simple elegance because it's bur- dened with pseudo-intellectualism, a myth without a moral. Technically the film fails as well. Mann has lost any of the magic he wO17 I I I lamely escapes Ian McKellen uses a talisman to stave off the supernatural force held within a mysterious fortress in 'The Keep.' commanded in The Thief and resorts to lamely copying the techniques of other filmmakers. The misty atmosphere with shafts of almost solid light cutting through recalls Ridley Scott, but without the aura of mystery. Every shot is crammed full of visual texture a la Kubrick or Weir, butswithoutthe submerged kinesthetic presence. The man simply has no command of his medium. In the opening sequence of the film he employs a lengthy editing montage, but without a motif to give it any weight. It's a crass display of em- pty virtuosity, and sets the tone for the rest of the film. When he tries to manipulate his audience, the best he can do is fall back on the insultingly stupid trick of making his actors jump at sudden noises and walk backwards into dark rooms. Nor is there any mood of dread or suspense, as most of the deaths occurr off-screen. We hear the actors talking about murder but we can't feel their apprehension. Imagine what Jaws would have been like if all the shark at- tacks had been discussed but not shown, and you are supposed to get the idea. The production design by John Box is not particularly inspired either. His design for The Keep uses a lot of set space but fails to be effective. The sweeping, streamlined arches and ramps intrinsically conflict with the overt primitivism and cancel each other out. The Rumanian village is a step up from *the old Universal backlot, but consisting of only three 'or four houses, it seems unrealistically small. And the houses, with their fresh-painted gingerbread look, would be more at home as an EPCOT attraction. The op- ticals, so integral a part of a film of this nature are pathetically cheap looking. A lackluster array of grainy superim- positions, amateurish matte paintings, and crudely rotoscoped lightning bolts, inferior even to what one often sees in TV commercials. The score by Tangerine Dream is an inexhaustible electronic blare. It doesn't underscore the action as much as drown out the voices. The actors seem painfully unsure as to how to interpret their characters. Jurgen Prochnow plays much the same role as in Das Boot, a sympathetic German ashamed of his uniform. This time he talks to himself and twitches a lot but he's not as developped. Scott Glenn projects none of the energy he displayed in The Right Stuff, wandering about looking pained andconfused, as if someone told him he was playing the Silver Surfer. Under pounds of uncon- vincing latex prosthetics, Ian McKellen does a great impression of John Carradine as a mad scientist, uninten- tionally. Alberta Watson's acting range seems limited to posing for the camera and parting her lips. And, in the grand manner of Hollywood window dressing, she takes her clothes off for an un- needed lovemaking scene. :Ultimately The Keep leaves one feeling only dumbstruck at how such a poorly conceived film ever got financed in the first place. Paramount would have been better off forbidding its release and writing the whole thing off as a loss. Or even better, they should have stuck it in a special vault. One not designed to keep anyone from getting in but... Records q Elvis Presley - A Legendary Performer, Vol 4 (RCA) Some people get resurrected more often than others. Consider Mr. Presley, whose umpteenth post-mortem record, Elvis - A Legendary Perfor- mer, Vol. 4, has just been released. Six years have passed since the king of rock and roll last lay down at Graceland, and still his voice is uplif-' ting and lifted up. Volume four features dead Elvis singing live from Las Vegas, live from Madison Square Garden, live on 1968 television. There's even an airheaded live interview from Tampa, made in 1956, when the phenomenon was still without paunch or rhinestone-studded jumpsuit. The living gem of the collec.tion is a previously unreleased outtake from the original Sun Sessions, entitled "When It Rains, It Really Pours." Still raw and raunchy from 1955, the Voice never died, although it can't quite make it through the song. Elvis also fails to finish a dripping version of "Are You Lonesome Tonight" recorded in Las Vegas in 1969. And, although he's not laughing, the Vegas duet with Ann- Margret will crack up even the most stoic admirers. Still, you've got to admire his tenacity and enduring relevance. The King is dead, long live the king. - Ben Ticho 4 Univers MA S -1 ity Activities Center iS MEETING 1 Monday, Anderson R VIEWPOINT L HOMECOMING MICHIGRAS *3*Un A ^"r UrA kU January 1 7:30p.m. loom, Michi Committees: 6, 1984 gan Union MUSKET LEGE BOWL IAL EVENTS Dance Theatre Studio 711 N. University (near State St.) Ann Arbor Classes in ballet, modern, jazz, tap. I! ' y j ' _ ECTURES . COL SPEC A nc a,'- f r