Short Take: E. T. the Extra-Terrestrial

Director Steven Spielberg's E. T. the Extra-Terrestrial is an enchanting picture, and one of the two or three finest children's movies ever made. The story is about an extra-terrestrial visitor who is accidentally left behind by its landing party. Looking for shelter, it befriends a lonely 10-year-old (Henry Thomas), who lives in a suburban development with his mother (Dee Wallace), older brother (Robert Macnaughton), and kid sister (Drew Barrymore). The drama comes from the alien's efforts to contact its people, and to stay out of the clutches of the government investigators looking to capture it. Spielberg sets up the story with a deft mix of slapstick, visual poetry, and emotional nuance. He also delivers some magical moments, such as the airborne bicycle ride over the forest near the 10-year-old's home. The heart of the story, though, is the rapport between the alien and the 10-year-old. In dramatizing it, Spielberg hits some of the most powerful notes of love and friendship in all of film. This sentimental adventure movie leaves one thrilled, happy, and teary-eyed, all at the same time. The screenplay is credited to Melissa Mathison. Allen Daviau provided the cinematography. The score is by John Williams. The wizardly Carlo Rambaldi designed the alien and oversaw the animatronics.

Short Take: Koyaanisqatsi

Koyaanisqatsi, a documentary directed by Godfrey Reggio, is a sublime film. One is tempted to describe it as a non-narrative effort, but that’s not quite accurate. The imagery has a fairly obvious theme: the beauty of the land is despoiled by the presence of humanity and its technology. But the simple (if not callow) environmental polemic is fairly easy to overlook. Reggio uses basic juxtaposition to convey the theme. It's hardly sophisticated, but he thankfully doesn't belabor the effect. What is sophisticated is his ability to shape the waves of environmental imagery into an elegant compositional whole. The shots are never static; with immobile subjects such as landscape formations and urban buildings, the camera moves for them. When there’s movement within the frame, Reggio often varies the speed with time-lapse and slow-motion techniques. The imagery never lacks for grandeur, and the visual rhythms always keep one attentive. With the counterpoint of composer Philip Glass’ gorgeous score, the film makes for a powerful immersive experience. It’s a cinematic symphony. Ron Fricke provided the breathtaking cinematography. Fricke and Alton Walpole are credited with the editing. The film is the first of a trilogy; Powaqqatsi and Naqoyqatsi followed.

Short Take: Tootsie

Tootsie (1982) is perhaps the finest comedy ever produced in Hollywood. Several traditional elements are there--the false/mistaken identity, the cross-dressing, the ambitious fool of a protagonist--and they're perfectly realized in terms of the story. The setting is the New York acting world. Dustin Hoffman stars as a rigidly perfectionist actor whom no producer can stand. Unable to find work, he creates a female alter ego to audition for a TV soap opera, and gets hired. The gender-confusion humor finds rich veins to mine in every aspect of the actor's life, including his relationship with his girlfriend (Teri Garr), dealings with his playwright roommate (Bill Murray), and just about everything to do with the TV show. There he encounters hilarious challenges with the show's actresses, its aging-lothario leading man (George Gaynes), and its obnoxiously sexist director (Dabney Coleman). Things get especially complicated when he falls in love with a co-star (Jessica Lange), only to find that her father (Charles Durning) has fallen in love with his alter ego. Director Sydney Pollack keeps the terrific script (by Larry Gelbert, Murray Schisgal, Don McGuire, and an uncredited Elaine May) crackling along. Dustin Hoffman gives a masterful performance. His timing is dazzling, and he gives the actor and his female alter ego distinct comic personalities. The supporting cast, which also includes Pollack as the actor's agent, is nothing less than outstanding. The film was a career peak for nearly everyone involved.

Short Take: Personal Best

This review was originally published on Pol Culture.

With films such as Chinatown, Shampoo, and The Last Detail to his credit, Robert Towne is rightly considered one of the finest screenwriters in Hollywood history. But with Personal Best, his engaging 1982 directorial debut, he handled the project as a director’s film. He doesn’t appear to have started with a fleshed-out screenplay. The film’s story--the relationship of two track-and-field athletes (Mariel Hemingway and Patrice Donnelly) over the four years they spend training for the 1980 Summer Olympics--is rather slight. There’s an offhand, casual feel to the dialogue, and the only notable suspense comes from the question of how Towne will handle the anticlimactic ending. (The United States and several other countries boycotted the Moscow-hosted 1980 games, so the athletes trained for a goal they were not allowed to realize.) Towne’s approach to the film was to use the script as a bare-bones foundation; he seems to have discovered the film in the shooting and shaped it in the editing. The picture has a loose, improvisatory feel. Towne is also enamored with the physicality of the athletes. He builds whole scenes out of the drama of their exertions and repose. He also doesn't hide his admiration for their physical beauty. The admiration is platonic, though; there’s nothing prurient about his tone. His tastefulness extends to his handling of the relationship of the Hemingway and Donnelly characters, who are romantically involved for most of the film. The film was unusual for its time; Towne treats lesbianism as no big deal. He isn’t judgmental, and he doesn’t congratulate himself on the enlightenment of his portrayal. Romantic inclinations are depicted as just another aspect of the women’s characters. Overall, the film is a fresh and lively effort. It holds up quite well over three decades after its release. Scott Glenn co-stars as the women's coach. The cinematography is by Michael Chapman.

Short Take: Ladies and Gentlemen, the Fabulous Stains

This review was originally published on Pol Culture.

Ladies and Gentleman, The Fabulous Stains, directed by Lou Adler from a script by Nancy Dowd, is the definition of a sleeper film. All but entirely shot in early 1980, and barely released to theaters a couple of years later, it found a cult audience through a handful of late-night cable-TV showings. Despite a substantial underground reputation, it didn’t receive a proper video release until 2008. Looking at the picture now, it seems an almost quintessential film of its time. A 15-year-old Diane Lane plays an orphaned Pennsylvania girl who starts a band with her younger sister (Marin Kanter) and their cousin (Laura Dern). The trio joins a low-rent tour featuring a washed-up metal act and an up-and-coming English punk group. Despite being barely able to play a note, they become a regional phenomenon. Lane’s character appears on stage as the prototypical Riot grrrl: flamboyant make-up and clothes, an even more flamboyant “skunk” hairstyle, and attitude a mile wide. Thanks to some chance television exposure, she inspires a legion of teenage girls who copy her look and persona. They eventually turn on her as just another rip-off fad. The film is far from perfect. Dowd’s script (credited to her pseudonym Rob Morton) is either truncated or undeveloped in its treatment of the trio’s rise and (particularly) their fall. The handling of the romance between Lane’s character and the punk band’s lead singer (a babyface-handsome Ray Winstone) is similarly unsatisfactory. The low budget also shows, especially with the poorly matched post-synching sound levels in the dialogue scenes. Yet the film feels remarkably true to its subject matter. It captures the anger, desperation, and go-for-broke dreaming that fired the punk movement. Diane Lane’s performance is one of the definitive movie portraits of adolescence. Winstone and Christine Lahti, who plays the Lane character’s aunt, are almost as impressive. The other members of the Winstone character’s band are played by Paul Cook and Steve Jones of The Sex Pistols and The Clash's Paul Simonon; the group's two numbers are sensational. The closing sequence, shot two years after the rest of the film, is a terrific pastiche of early-80s music video.