Notes on Over the Edge, Monsieur Verdoux, and a Kodachrome documentary that needs your help
by Jim Ridley @countrylifeblog
The victim of a bungled theatrical release, Jonathan Kaplan's 1979 drama Over the Edge remains a piercing study of bored, disaffected teens seething in a sterile Colorado planned community. The movie's acutely sympathetic to its young cast (including Matt Dillon in his film debut), but Kaplan holds up the festering situation from all sides: the kids with no rights and nothing to do; the parents with justified worries; the police ill-equipped to deal with juvenile offenders.
For the movie's free screening (on projected DVD) at 2 p.m. this Saturday, Nov. 20, at the downtown Nashville Public Library, Popular Materials staffer Bill Chamberlain has taped an interview with Charlie Haas, who wrote the screenplay with future River's Edge/Twin Peaks director Tim Hunter. Haas went on to write a pair of gems for director Joe Dante, Gremlins 2: The New Batch and Matinee; he discusses those as well. Haas recorded a special audio introduction for Saturday's screening; you can hear the whole interview at www.popmatic.nashvillepubliclibrary.org/tag/interviews/.
• Charlie Chaplin distressed audiences and critics alike in 1947 with his somber black comedy Monsieur Verdoux, which posits murder for money as the logical extension of capitalism. Still controversial today, it's now regarded as one of his late masterpieces. Chaplin plays a former bank teller who's found a new way to earn a living: seducing and marrying rich widows, then killing them. In an inspired pairing, the movie screens Nov. 21-22 at The Belcourt as part of its ongoing Chaplin retro, bracketed Nov. 20 & 22 by Chaplin's polarizing 1958 satire A King in New York.
• Just in time for Thanksgiving comes Junkyard Dog, the story of "a disarmingly charming, cannibalistic serial rapist." Shot in Middle Tennessee with lots of local talent, writer-director Kim Bass's shocker stars Vivica A. Fox and one of our favorite actors, Brad Dourif; it has its premiere at 7:15 and 9:30 p.m. Sunday, Nov. 21 at The Belcourt. Tickets are $10.
• Speaking of local film projects, check out this page: kodachromemovie.com. With the world's last Kodachrome lab set to stop processing the film stock on Dec. 30, Nashville filmmaker Davis Watson is working on a documentary elegy. The trailer looks great, and the filmmakers have raised nearly two-thirds of their $12,500 goal on Kickstarter, with contributions set to close 10 p.m. Thanksgiving Day. Visit www.kickstarter.com/projects/1977341583/kodachrome-the-movie.
• Opening this week at Green Hills: the Valerie Plame docudrama Fair Game from The Bourne Identity director Doug Liman, with Naomi Watts and Sean Penn. Opening everywhere: Paul Haggis' action thriller The Next Three Days, with Russell Crowe attempting to bust wife Elizabeth Banks out of jail. This week's Bollywood offering at the Hollywood 27: Aishwarya Rai and Hrithik Roshan in Sanjay Leela Bhansali's musical drama Guzaarish, in which a paralyzed magician fights to be removed from life support.
