Maldita Paixão

WINDOWS (1980) */****

One of the all-time worst films I've ever seen. It's been 25 years since I saw this in a tiny theatre and simultaneously watched it vanish from history without a trace. This recent second viewing via a VHS dupe from some unknown source did not improve things much, but I've got a story to tell about this movie and how it's eluded me for such a very long time. This has become almost a "lost" film, and I'll have a theory later as to why nobody's seeing it anymore, aside from the basic fact that it simply stinks.

In 1980 I was 17 and went to see WINDOWS at the movies with my kid sister. It was only one of the two times in my life I ever recall going to a theatre with her, and we were both in shock at just how abysmal the feature before our eyes was. It was boring, badly acted, and by the final act, completely laughable. The whole theatre was in hysterics. It's not the kind of experience you forget when you're a movie fan, even 25 years after the fact.

The movie starts in its New York City setting with lousy actress Talia Shire (who apparently thinks she's still playing the timid Adrian from the first ROCKY film) being assaulted and raped in her own apartment, getting forced at knifepoint to moan and groan into the attacker's tape recorder. We later discover (and since it's not presented as any kind of mystery I'm not ruining anything that hasn't already been ruined) that Shire's got a psychotic and horny lesbian neighbor (Elizabeth Ashley) across the hall who's so in love with her that Ashley actually hired this rapist/goon to pull off the crime - so she can play the tape over and over and get off on it to her heart's content.

When Talia decides to move to a nicer apartment to start anew, Elizabeth and her loose screws aren't very far behind. She'll do anything to make Talia love her, as her ineffective psychiatrist seems to be aware. Enter vapid policeman Joseph Cortese (who's about as interesting as a door stop) to romance Shire (what the hell do Ashley and Cortese see in her insipid character anyway?) and "help" her ... in an unbelievable sequence, Shire is in a cab with a driver whom she recognizes as the rapist; she asks to be let off at a phone booth, calls the police, but is instructed to get back in the car with her attacker till the cops can get to them!

Besides being ineptly acted, WINDOWS is also dull and boring, but there's something curiously watchable about it for fans of bad movies only, for all its incompetence. It was the first and only film (no wonder) to be directed by cinematographer Gordon Willis; it was his photography that graced THE GODFATHER and some of Woody Allen's picturesque movies, so his shots of New York may be the one thing to watch for here, aside from getting a load of Elizabeth Ashley's embarrassing climax with Talia Shire. This film is also notorious as being the very FIRST film to be released in the entire decade of the 1980's, and of course as of this writing it's a movie that is virtually impossible to locate, as it was never released on home video except in France (I believe). It was through the wonders of the Internet that I was able to hunt this thing down and see how bad it still is.

So why has this film been so hard to track down? Well, for starters, it's got to be a humiliation to everyone involved. I'm fairly positive it's owned by Warner Brothers, and my personal opinion is that, in this Politically Correct world of today, we just cannot have a film available that depicts a homicidal maniac when she also happens to be a lesbian. But that in itself has made the movie all the more desirable for a viewing, and it's at the very least a reminder of the type of movies filmmakers used to be allowed to make. Proceed at your own risk -- if you can ever find a copy, that is.

There are two reasons to watch this movie: Gordon Willis's cinematography & Elizabeth Ashley. It's not as lame as it is made out to be and has exquisite production values, but that being said, it is very niche, succeeding neither as a slasher nor a thriller, but occupying some odd space in between.

"Windows" also reminds us that you can be a great cinematographer but that doesn't necessarily translate to directing: in fact, Gordon Willis never directed another movie again. As far as Elizabeth Ashley, for those not acquainted she was sort of a Tallulah Bankhead of the 70s and 80s. She had a storied Broadway career and multiple husbands and was on The Tonight Show more than 20 times simply because Carson found her amusing. She is captivating, even in claptrap melodrama like this.

This movie was lambasted by the critics when it first came out, snuffing out Talia Shire's major studio leading lady career in the process. Shire had been a hot property after "The Godfather" and "Rocky" movies...but she made three high profile bombs in a row: "Old Boyfriends", "Prophecy", and, finally, "Windows." Film careers ending after a bomb or two happened to a lot of actresses back then and Shire was probably given more chances than most but the bottom line was she just couldn't carry a film.

The movie looks terrific. Ashley wears a series of shimmery Bloomingdales middle-aged Disco blouses and it is impossible not to look at her. She's very interesting as an actress. The city is shot like a lullaby...to Brooklyn (The Brooklyn Heights Promenade and Cher's Cranberry Street block in Moonstruck figure prominently, as does The River Café as well as Fulton Street near Brooklyn Bridge Park, or as it referred to in Windows: "River Street") and Pearl Street in Lower Manhattan. The use of locations is a wonder and everything is very desolate. It definitely creates a mood of unease.

Now, the problems. I don't have an issue with Shire's character, exactly. She is beyond mousey and nearly sexless, with her Prince Valiant hair and series of brown patterned sweater vests and plaid shirts worthy of an assistant librarian. She is certainly not someone one would expect Ashley to be obsessed with. Perhaps that is the point? But we'll never know because the entire story is underdeveloped. It seems to want to coast by on suspense but that is a flaw because there is hardly any suspense whatsoever. The film may have somewhat succeeded had it put some effort into characterizations. Instead we get some hints at what could have been and a choppy series of dull vignettes culminating in an anticlimactic showdown between Ashley and Shire. I do like that they don't spell everything out for you and, if you pause to think, the chain of events is coherent. But it's just not enough.

"Windows" could have been interesting. I think they were going for something akin to "let's make a women's picture about sexual obsession" but then lost their way. Ultimately, it is almost completely devoid of energy but a pleasure to look at and Ashley is always a treat to observe...even when she is wearing eyeglasses the size of dessert plates and stroking an enormous phallic telescope.

I found this film the other day at a market stall; quite an obscure film. The film appears to be quite good when you read the back of the box, but when you watch it...really awful. The only thing Gordon Willis seemed to care about was the photography. In a film like this you need great acting. We don't get great acting however and you cannot take the film seriously. It just gets ludicrous at times, especially the psycho-lesbian lover storyline. It is disgracefully misogynistic, which is another reason not to watch the film.

I will say that the film's photography is stunning though (similar to woody allen's 'interiors') but that is the only reason to watch this garbage.

WINDOWS reminds me of REFLECTIONS IN A GOLDEN EYE. When REFLECTIONS came out in 1967, it had the book thrown at it for being deviant, sick, perverse, reactionary, offensive, pretentious (which is such a mouthful that it makes one believe that the hater(s)doth protest too much). On top of these epithets, was the final body blow, and "just plain boring." It's difficult to be all of the above and be "just plain boring" to boot which is the reason I was compelled to check out both movies. I'm glad I did. WINDOWS is not the outright triumph REFLECTIONS IN A GOLDEN EYE is, but it's thoughtful and original about something that shouldn't be dismissed by film lovers out of court. It's not sleazy or exploitative; as a matter of fact, that's a major problem with it. It refuses to further sensationalize its wildly lurid "givens." It's artful enough in its intentions to try to suggest that the tragedy of urban life is not the violence of melodramatic evil, but the glass cubicles people live in that link and separate them in devastatingly emotional ways. Gordon Willis' direction is typical of a first time director. It suffers from being too studied but it's far from daft or moronic; visually, it's as thought through as REAR WINDOW, its obvious predecessor in voyeurism. But there's nothing in REAR WINDOW, as seriously naked and exposed as Elizabeth Ashley's performance. It's interesting that when great actors like Brando (in REFLECTIONS IN A GOLDEN EYE), and Ashley in WINDOWS attempt something that goes beyond the average viewer's opinion of how a homosexual SHOULD be portrayed, there's is an automatic reflex action on the part of said viewer to distance themselves from the performance, to laugh at it or automatically dismiss it as being "over the top." This response is, in fact, more reactionary than the sins that have been dumped in the picture's lap. WINDOWS is not as dumb or insensitive as the knee jerk response it provokes in most people who feign an interest in the dark side until it becomes too real.

The general opinion of this movie is either that it is terrible, or that it is SO bad, it's actually good. Well, I don't think this movie is really "good" in any sense of the word, but it's not that bad either. It definitely has some good aspects. The cinematography is outstanding, not surprisingly perhaps since it was directed by famed cinematographer Gordon Willis. Visually it was kind of and attempt to update the moody film-noir style of the 40's and 50's to the present day (as of 1980 anyway). It was also filmed in NYC and it captures a lot of the palpably sleazy ambiance of the city in that era that can also be seen in films like "Taxi Driver" or "Dog Day Afternoon".

The plot is ridiculous, of course, but that's not necessarily a bad thing either. In fact, the people who were so offended by the movie originally should have taken into account that this movie defames real-life lesbians about as much as "Roadrunner" cartoons defame real-life coyotes. (And Wile E.Coyote gives a much more subdued performance and usually shreds less scenery than Elizabeth Ashley does in this movie). Besides the problem is not that lesbians are frequently portrayed as villains in movies. Even taking their relative numbers into account, there are still far less lesbian villains in movies (not including sexy bisexual women, which is a whole different thing) than there are white male villains. There is certainly a lack of POSITIVE portrayals of lesbians in movies perhaps even today, but that's a different issue. And, ironically, the typical negative portrayal of lesbians in the media does not generally involve them being murderous stalkers, but rather being shrill, self-righteous, humorless, man-hating busy-bodies who want to censor everything under the sun that offends their perpetually outraged sensibilities. Hmmm, I wonder where that stereotype comes from?

But back to the movie, this is one of 70's/80's movies that would actually be PERFECT for a re-make. They could put a really sexy actress in the lead who doesn't play the whole thing as deadly earnestly as ole "Yo! Adrienne!" does here. It would actually be pretty hard to best Elizabeth Ashley's campy, OTT performance, but I think modern audiences would certainly appreciate a performance like this a lot more than they did back in 1980. This isn't a good movie, of course,but why re-make a GOOD movie? Re-make, DVD release, or both--this is definitely long-due for some kind of revival.