Film #44: Straight Time

Since 1972, Dustin Hoffman had been obsessed with making Straight Time, an adaptation of ex-convict Ed Bunker's novel No Beast So Fierce. It was meant to be the actor's directorial debut but, concluding that directing and performing were chores too big for him to handle in tandem, he brought in British director Ulu Grosbard to helm things behind the camera. Good move, because in 1978's sadly forgotten Straight Time Hoffman was obviously able to concentrate heavily on his
character. He's at his best as Max Dembo, a small-time thief who, upon his prison release, tries mightily to straighten up while fighting a bureaucracy that's cruelly written him off as a lost cause. Gary Busey (who appears with his then-young son Jake) is the lovable "Big Bear" whose kindness and slow-witted speed get the best of him. And Harry Dean Stanton hits a career high with a knotted-up portrayal of a restless ex-con who joins forces with Max in what is surely one of the most tense jewel heist scenes ever filmed. M. Emmett Walsh is a VERY assholish probation officer who gets his comeuppance. Kathy Bates (thin!) is Busey's long-suffering wife. And the crown of ALL these great performances here goes to the beautiful, smart, transfixing Theresa Russell, whose showing as Dembo's understanding---maybe TOO understanding--girlfriend was a career-maker. I could watch Russell all day, because there's something there behind those beautiful eyes!

The writer, Ed Bunker, also cameos quite stunningly in Straight Time as Mickey, one of Dembo's shadowy associates. People should know that the autobiographical novel this was based on was written by Bunker while he was still in prison (he wanted to give the cons out there something to read about, so he says)! Bunker followed this movie with appearances in Miracle Mile, The Running Man, Walter Hill's The Long Riders and, most famously, as the ill-fated, under-used Mr. Blue in Quentin Tarantino's Reservoir Dogs. With its accuracy, grittiness, intimacy and cruelty, his Straight Time is one of the greatest crime films ever made.

Film #43: Trans

Florida filmmaker Julius Goldberger's Trans splashed down at 1999's Sundance festival like a minor post-French New Wave masterwork unearthed decades after being inturred, mysteriously, near the swampy Everglades. Plainly influenced by Truffaut's The 400 Blows -- Goldberger obviously wanted more after Antoine Doniel reached the ocean tide -- Trans follows juvenile prison escapee Ryan Kazinski (played with haunting blankness by Ryan Daugherty) as he traverses southern swamps, suburbs and city streets, driven only by an over-percolated need to keep moving, keep going, keep going on... Trans takes extra inspiration from Godard (in its disjointed editing and sound) and Cassevetes (in realistic but short scenes like Ryan's jittery powwow with overly curious locals lumbering outside a country mart). All the while Goldberger's quietly affecting movie astutely, colorfully dissects a young Turk who, even out of the klink, remains jailed in his own restless skin.

Film #42: Sisters

This is the first in a promised series of shorter posts, for those of you who don't have no durn time...

Made back when De Palma’s Hitchcock-cribbing packed more charm than it did in later years, Sisters stars Margot Kidder as surgically-separated Siamese twins, one of whom is degenerating into a knife-wielding killer. Jennifer Salt is the newspaper columnist who witnesses one of Kidder’s murders and tries to blow the whistle on her. Clever and creepy, the film’s best moments feature De Palma’s simple but effective use of split-screen effects--a visual pun in a movie about twins--to wickedly spice up crucial scenes, like the murder and its clean-up. Goosed up by an urgent Bernard Herrmann score (now, there’s someone who knew how to do horror movie music, from Hitchcock's Psycho to De Palma's Obsession ) and one of the oddest endings for any movie ever. Sisters is a great ‘70s-flavored horror staple.