Reviews

Up!, writer-director Russ Meyer's twenty-fifth film, is a rare find: a feature that should be a bona-fide turn-on for many. A character who bears a corny resemblance to Adolf Hitler is murdered after enjoying some gay and straight sex. Most of the rest of the film deals with the question "whodunit?" although the activities of busty characters like Margo Winchester are interesting distractions for sure. This is the second Meyer film I've seen that features a black woman giving head to somebody, and the subject matter hasn't ceased to titillate me yet. Meyer, or "King Leer" as he was sometimes called, hasn't failed to deliver an erotic, primal, and at times silly motion picture that wouldn't be complete without the undulating of a totally nude Kitten Natividad as she narrates the story. Natividad's "roll call" of the characters gets a bit tedious by the third go-round, but who watches Meyer films for the story? The visual impact of many a "King Leer" film's sensual subject matter makes up its "money shots," and with a character wearing a leather mask flicking a lengthy tongue around in front of the camera, they're in there...and then some.

Gus Van Sant's Milk, the biopic of martyred gay rights activist Harvey Milk, arrives at a crest of a tide of new queer cinema. The Oscar-winning film represents progress in gay filmmakers' autonomy as a kind of celebration of a gay icon who worked to secure gays and lesbians greater rights in society. It also tempts mainstream viewers with its edgy, transgressive subject matter. For these reasons and others, Milk is a cinematic triumph.

The feature opens with Harvey Milk taping his last testament, which is to be listened to only "in the event of my death by assassination." It then moves to a vignette of Milk making the moves on a young Scott Smith on a N.Y.C. subway staircase. Milk tells Smith after they become involved that on his 40th birthday, he hasn't done a thing he's proud of. He wonders if he'll make it to see age 50.

The couple relocates to San Francisco, and Milk opens a camera shop on Castro street, which will become his political stage of sorts. Milk discovers his knack for organizing people and at last, his vocation is found: politics. The leader of the Teamsters walks into the camera store and asks Milk if he can get his people to help with the not-so-successful Coors beer boycott. Milk gets Coors beer out of all of the gay bars in the Castro area, and a week later the Teamsters' union hires openly gay drivers for the first time. Milk soon receives the title "The Mayor of Castro Street." Director Van Sant doesn't rein himself in too much, resorting to the type of creative flourishes you'd expect in one of his newer films and not in a by-the-numbers biopic. Milk campaigns for supervisor of the California State Assembly and many of his slogans are illustrated for us on posters that take up the frame. As attacks on gays spike in the area, the gays start using whistles to announce when one is getting physically assaulted. One homosexual is murdered, and Van Sant shoots an entire scene using the reflection of Milk talking to a cop in a tiny, bloodied metal whistle.

For the most part, though, the film simply tells the story of Milk's rise and fall. Harvey repeatedly runs for supervisor and eventually wins an election by 30%, against sixteen other candidates. Milk becomes a dedicated foe of sizeable corporations and real estate developers, but especially a proponent of gay rights. A civil rights bill prohibiting discrimination based on sexual affiliation is signed into law with Milk's participation. The next issue that Milk faces is the Briggs Initiative, also known as Proposition 6, which would make the dismissal of gay teachers, and any public school employees who support gay rights in California, compulsory. A new battle is on.

Actor Sean Penn is masterful in his portrayal of the grandiose Milk, and his Oscar win is well-deserved. A maven of details, Penn takes on his subject's circumstances, mannerisms and psychology. The stellar cast is rounded out by other natural wonders, including Emile Hirsch as activist Cleve Jones, James Franco as Milk's paramour and friend Scott Smith, and Josh Brolin as Milk's fellow supervisor Dan White.

As everyone knows, Harvey Milk was assassinated - and it's likely that some of his power only increased with this tragedy. In the film, he says that not only gays but all minorities have to be given hope. The film seems to work best when understood as part of a greater social conflict: the one for basic equality. The aftermath of Milk's murder includes riots, and why not? Harvey is a relatable figure. When he calls Scott Smith close to the film's climax and Smith tells Milk how proud he is of him, we can empathize and perhaps realize something we, too, have done to be proud of. And just before the credits roll, as the filmmakers show us the actors' faces and juxtapose them with their real-life counterparts, showing us what became of them, the movie's magic gives way to the present-day reality of this struggle's fruits. Milk is Van Sant's multilayered, very alive, utterly engaging masterpiece. Bravo, Mr. Van Sant.

There's a bit of unintended notoriety connected with the title of this film. You have to see the 1996 Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez writer-director collaboration From Dusk Til Dawn, an un-P.C. film if ever there was one, to get it. The movie's characters have set up shop at a trucker's and biker's bar, the Titty Twister, to cool their heels. The M.C. announces a new entertainer for the stage, a woman named Santanico Pandemonium. The voluptuous actress Salma Hayek steps out draped with a huge snake and little else, and proceeds to rock her hips to the delight of every man who can see her. It's a stunning moment toward the middle of a not very striking flick.

Satanico Pandemonium isn't only exploitation; it belongs to a genre called "nunsploitation." The place is Spain and the time is most likely pre-1834. Sister Maria (Cecilia Pezet) is a devoted nun who finds herself visited by visions of Satan, or Luzbel. The devil appears as a man to Sister Maria, and using obvious Biblical symbolism, tends to carry a bitten-into apple. Sister Maria is startled and horrified by the series of temptations that happen to her via the film's faulty special effects. As another user has pointed out, this is an obsession scenario by an external devil.

One important observation should be stated. The actress playing Sister Maria is very beautiful with warm, bedroom eyes, and many of us (meaning men) wouldn't mind watching her getting robbed of her virtue - as well as tormented by particular sins. But what happens is with a little influence from Beelzebub, Sister Maria soon indulges in lesbianism, child seduction and heresy. The film has a church-like quality to the way it moves slowly and harps upon moments of less-than-dramatic value, and with its fantastic logic, Sister Maria turns into hell in a headdress. One scene in particular is actually quite disturbing, with Sister Maria covering her naked, bloody body with her uniform.

The flick isn't entirely baldfaced exploitation though, and has interesting questions about faith in its dialogue. That aside, the flick's appeal seems rather obvious. In life, most of us want what we cannot have, and the fantasy of despoiling such a person (i.e., a nun) can be very powerful. Satanico Pandemonium uses its subject matter effectively, and despite an unsatisfying story resolution, it packs quite a wallop.