Pandemonium Stirs "The Black Waters of Echo's Pond"

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Parent Category: Film and the Arts

Category: Reviews

Published on Saturday, 10 April 2010 20:32

Written by Maitland McDonagh / Miss FlickChick

Directed by Gabriel Bologna
Written by Sean Clark, from a story by Bologna and Michael Berenson
Starring: Arcadiy Golubovich, Robert Patrick, Elise Avellan, Electra Avellan, Nick Mennell, Mircea Monroe, Walker Howard, Danielle Harris, M.D. Walton, James Duval, Adama Paladino, Richard Tyson

In 1927, a team of archeologists finds a tomb dedicated to the pagan god Pan. Team leader Niegel (Adama Paladino) lays claim to a pre-Biblical board game entombed inside, which he takes home with him to Beacon's Island, Maine — infuriating Nicholas (Richard Tyson), who underwrote the expedition and who wants what's his. Niegel responds that he's hidden the game where no one will ever find it, and then kills Nicholas and himself.

Eighty years later, nine feckless friends arrive for a weekend of fun on the island, whose only resident is eccentric caretaker Pete (Robert Patrick). Well, make that eight friends — Anton (Arcadiy Golubovich) and his wife Erica (Elise Avellan); Anton’s best friend Josh (Nick Mennell) and his fiancee, Renee (Electra Avellan), Erica’s twin sister; Trent (Walker Howard) and his girlfriend Kathy (Danielle Harris); Rob (M.D. Walton), who got his sweet corporate gig through Trent but subsequently hop-scotched over his  friend; and buxom, blond, B-movie starlet Veronique (Mircea Monroe), whose relentless flirting has sometimes sorely tried the patience of her female friends — and one odd man out Rick (James Duval), whose drinking, drugging and relentlessly irresponsible carousing has alienated half his old friends and left him on thin ice with the rest.

Naturally, they find the ornate, wicked-weird looking game and decide to play — it must be just like Monopoly, they figure, only way cooler looking. Needless to say, the game quickly does what it does, unleashing repressed desires, exposing the fault lines beneath apparently solid relationships and ripping the scabs off unhealed wounds. The result is, well, pandemonium.

Credit where it's due to director Gabriel Bologna — the son of veteran actors Joseph Bologna and Renee Taylor — and screenwriter Sean Clark: The Pan game is a novel touch in an otherwise standard-issue slasher movie. And there's something almost subversive about the casting. Yes, the actors are better looking than the average group of nine friends in their twenties… at least, nine friends in their twenties who aren't in the movie business. But the fact that a third were clearly not born in the US (Golubvich is from Russia, the Avellans from Venezuela) and that where they came from has absolutely no bearing on their characters is, in its own way, as striking as seeing Night of the Living Dead’s Duane Jones in a role that wasn't written for black man. It's a casual acknowledgment that Americans come in many varieties. That they're all equally vulnerable to the Great God Pan's malevolent influence is also a given, though true to the much-mocked cliche, one of the black guys dies first. On the other hand, there's more than one — that, too, could be construed as progress of a sort within genre conventions.

For more by Maitland McDonagh: MissFlickChick.com

"Love is my sin" Reinterprets Shakespeare's Sonnets

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Parent Category: Film and the Arts

Category: Reviews

Published on Saturday, 10 April 2010 20:09

Written by Lucy Komisar

Written by William Shakespeare
Adapted and directed by Peter Brook
Starring Natasha Parry, Michael Pennington

Creating a richness in their arrangement that adds to the beauty of each poem, director Peter Brook has ordered 31 Shakespearean sonnets, dramatically recited by Natasha Parry and Michael Pennington, to create a striking theater piece. It elegantly expresses love as it consumes men and women in the highs and lows of their relationships and into their later years. The poems are grouped to praise love that lasts through time and to plumb the pain of separation; the torments of jealousy, self-deception, and guilt; and the sorrows of older age. That doesn't quite make a play, but it sets new standards for poetry reading.

The set is simple, some wood tables, chairs and stools on a Persian rug. Parry, who is Brook's wife, wears black slacks and a long coat with swirls in the back. Pennington has a sweater over his black trousers. Franck Krawczyk sets off the poems with the 17th-century music of Louis Couperin on accordion and keyboard.

Under Brook's sharp but subtle direction, in which the drama enhances but never effaces the lines, the actors play to each other and against each other. They move close; they drift or march apart. They are sensitive and they are furious. They are anxious. Sometimes they are forgiving. Pennington seems to suffer more. Parry gets angrier.

There's a sense of Shakespeare looking back. The first section, Devouring Time, reflects on the love and beauty that lasts even in the lover's thoughts, which makes losses disappear. It compares the speaker to "Bare ruined choirs, where late the sweet birds sang." The lover knows that time will take his love away: "This thou perceiv'st which makes thy love more strong/ to love that well which though must leave ere long."

Separation brings conflicting emotions. There is pain felt by a lover who waits like a slave and a fool, regardless of what the beloved may be doing. Alternatively, there is joy at thinking of the loved one: "For thy sweet love rememb'red such wealth brings/ that then I scorn to change my state with Kings." Or sorrow: "…thou away, the very birds are mute." And on a journey, "My grief lies onward and my joy behind." And "..my thoughts (from far where I abide) intend a zealous pilgrimage to thee." (Just compare that with "Wish you were here!")

But then Jealousy arises, and with it protest, disillusion, self-deception. Parry disputes: "Canst thou, O cruel, say I love thee not/ when I against myself with thee partake?" Pennington is distraught.  But perhaps the object of love is unworthy: "For I have sworn thee fair, and thought thee bright/who art as black as hell, as dark as night." And "So shall I live, supposing thou art true,/like a deceived husband; so loves' face / may still seem love to me, though altered new." "Thou mayst be false, and yet I know it not."

One might pretend: "Therefore I lie with her, and she with me, / and in our faults by lies we flattered be." Or worry: ‘"For thee watch I, whilst thou dost wake elsewhere,/ from me far off, with others all too near."

Or ask forgiveness: "Alas 'tis true, I have gone here and there," says Pennington on bended knee. It made him young, he admitted. Parry pushes him to the floor! But there is half regret: "Enjoyed no sooner but despised straight." And besides, the other is just as guilty: "..those lips of thine, / that have profaned their scarlet ornaments,/ and sealed false bonds of love as oft as mine." Finally, he persuades her not to hate: " ‘I hate' From hate away she threw,/ and saved my life, saying ‘not you'." Parry moves from the fury of the first "I hate" to the softness of the last forgiveness.

And lastly comes Time Defied, about death. Their faces are drawn and pensive. One asks a lover to forget "If thinking on me then should make you woe." But in another verse, the man wonders why she pines within but is "painting thy outwards wall so costly gay?" In the end love is "an ever-fixed mark/ that looks on tempests and is never shaken." And, Shakespeare finishes that sonnet with an undeniable avowal: "If this be error and upon me proved,/ I never writ, nor no man ever loved."

"Love is my sin"
Théâtre des Bouffes du Nord (Paris)/Theatre for a New Audience
The Duke on 42nd Street
229 West 42nd Street
New York City, New York
646-223-3010.
Opened April 1, 2010; closes April 17, 2010

For more by Lucy Komisar: TheKomisarScoop.com

Photos: Pascal Victor

On the Death and Rebirth of Punk Legends

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Parent Category: Film and the Arts

Category: Reviews

Published on Saturday, 10 April 2010 14:02

Written by Alex Smith

John Lydon's resurrected Public Image Ltd. performed on Jimmy Kimmel Live recently. The former Johnny Rotten, Lydon has withstood a lot of criticism for daring to christen this current ensemble PiL given the pointed absence of original members Keith Levene and Jah Wobble, but as the vocalist himself pointed out to Jimmy Kimmel, there have been 39 members in the band over the years.

Regardless, even with the inclusion of former Damned/Shriekback guitarist Lu Edmonds (who played with PiL circa the Bill Laswell-produced Album album and tour), it's hard to get excited about a PiL "reunion" featuring a rhythm section of unknowns (couldn't John have tried to patch things up with original drummer Martin Atkins?).

In any case, to a gathered throng of what looked like disinterested Nickeblack fans, nu-PiL took the stage (flanked by Bud Light banners). If you're interested, you can see them play "Rise" here and watch Kimmel talk with John here. PiL's Kimmel performance served as an opening salvo of sorts for their impending tour of North America. One wonders if this morning's news of the death of Lydon's former manager/svengali/nemesis, Malcolm McLaren will overshadow proceedings.

The loss of McLaren made for some sad news. Sure, he was dutifully reviled by never-say-die punk purists for allegedly fleecing the Sex Pistols and meticulously choreographing their messy implosion, but how much of that legend is actually genuine? I'll leave that to the rock historians to ponder.

McLaren gets less credit for other contributions like Bow Wow Wow, "Double Dutch" and the Fans album (among other things).

I'd actually seen the man here in New York City a couple of times. Far from the conniving swindler he's usually portrayed as, he usually looked like a dapper fop. The last time I encountered him was as recently as last summer. I was deep in the bowels of Penn Station, rushing to meet my wife and kids as they arrived from a spell in Long Island. As I was descending a flight of stairs to the platform, up came a nattily dressed McLaren.

"Malcolm!" I instinctively (and somewhat presumptuously) exclaimed. He flinched as if I was about to hit him. I felt quite sorry for that, and saluted him as I continued down the steps. I'd imagine Sex Pistols fans have given him a lot of unsolicited grief over the years.