Luna nera

It played here in Berkeley in the late 1970's at the repertory UC Theatre (now defunct of course), I saw it in Cologne in 1976, but it doesn't seem to have been picked up by any US distributor and it is not and has never been available on VHS, Laserdisc, or DVD anywhere in the world, AFAIK. And I have never seen it on cable tv (Sundance, IFC, you listening?).

A neo-surrealistic fantasy, it was promoted in newspaper ads in Germany as The Movie Where Animals Talk to People!

Weird and wonderful from beginning to end, IMHO. An old woman sitting at her kitchen table talking to a rat sitting on it. An 8 year old or so boy and girl playing in the yard and suddenly breaking into the complete love duet from Tristan & Isolde. Joe Dallesandro of Andy Warhol/Paul Morrisey movies, and lots more. I can't remember it very well at this point, it's been a quarter of a century since I saw it.

The number one film on my want list.

I must say, seeing this film was like an adult orientated verison of Alice in Wonderland; the material is dark and surreal as the music is eerie to set the mood of the film. The story revolves around a girl 'Lily' who finds herself stuck in a strange and bizarre world between fantasy and reality. Such events occurred in this film contains a talking unicorn, a teenager breast feeding an old woman (and later a unicorn?) and a naked children, frocking around the meadow as if nothing were watching them. Not since 'Eraserhead' have a seen such a bizarre, disturbing and fascinating work of art. A must see indeed for those of you who Cherish rare pieces of work like this.

It's a war-torn world in some sort of war between the sexes. Lily barely escapes a male military squad and finds a mysterious community living in a country mansion. They have lots of animals, lots of naked children, and an unicorn. There are a beautiful man, a pretty woman, and a bed-ridden old lady who seems to be their leader.

This is an experimental sci-fi film from French director Louis Malle. It's a lot of weirdness. I'm not sure about anything in this film. Lead actress Cathryn Harrison is not really acting as much as just existing in this weird world. She's very pretty but her range is somewhat limit. She is either a pissed off teen or a tensive teen and she alternates between the two. I don't know what else to say about this. I wish I knew the point Louis Malle is trying to make.

Imagine, if you will, that someone had taken all the brain-damaged noodlings of softcore pornographers and decided to make a movie of them, omitting all the nudity and sex. You'd have something about as stupid as this movie. On film, it's a waste of celluloid, on DVD, it's a waste of silicon, on cable, it's a waste of bandwidth. In whatever medium it's a waste of your time. And nothing more.

This is, in short, exactly the sort of film that gives European filmmakers bad reputations, and which makes film buffs look stupid when they try to maintain that it's not a brain-dead collection of semi-arresting images. Fans of this film describe it as a metaphor, an allegory, a symbolic representation of something else. But like Burbank, there is no there there in this film. It probably has something to do with coming of age, but the "something" it has to "do" with is so blurry that it's just not worth the bother of bringing it into focus.

The film does have one redeeming feature: it makes you feel like going out and doing something useful in the world to make up for the 100 minutes you totally wasted watching it. Also, you probably didn't commit any felonies while watching it. And when not committing a felony while watching it is a film's major justification, you know it has to suck beyond belief.

This movie is one of a kind. It was so weird I couldn't stop watching it. If you like strange and unusual movies like I do, then watch this one. You won't be disappointed. I've seen it 3 times so far and I still never ever get bored with it. I can only imagine what the writer was smoking when he wrote this story. It's one of those movies that stays with you forever. It makes no sense whatsoever, but, you can't stop watching it. For those of you who have never heard of it or seen it, you should definitely give it a whirl. You might have to watch it 2 or 3 times like I did, to try and understand what the hell is going on. Good luck and enjoy.