H E L T E R S K E L T E R - a review in progress

I am downloading a shot-on-video Jess Franco film from 2000 called Helter Skelter.

One of the director's least talked about productions.

A few less than enthusiastic user reviews on IMDb. A few blurry screengrabs. 

That's all I've researched so far.

Why choose to watch something like Helter Skelter? A film that is bound to be self-indulgent and terribly made? To see how old people cope with life. Jess evidently doesn't want to retire. I don't know if he can afford to. Perhaps not. Still, I prefer to think that Franco keeps making these 'attempts at cinema' because he loves the process, and not just to exploit his fans.

Lots of Jess' recent productions are near worthless. Exercises in padding and digital video manipulation. They're mere excuses for Franco to keep busy. He has to produce something. Something that can be  packaged with catchy cover art and  supplemented with another of his fascinating interviews. With Paula-Paula it was the extra material (Jess clad in a bright red jumper) that I could sit through without getting a headache while the main feature left almost no impression on me.

So far I've downloaded half the DVD. Some of the .VOB files are already playable. 

In such fragmented state Helter Skelter looks fascinating. 

Over-saturated colours, uncalled-for slow-motion effects, superimposed imagery plus off-screen narration. Supposedly it's quotes from de Sade. This narration could really help putting the abstract imagery and episodes of simulated copulation into context, to make the film bearable. I wonder if I'll be able to sit through at least 30 minutes of Helter Skelter once it's fully downloaded.

KAMIKAZE 1989 is THE FIFTH ELEMENT for Euro art-house buffs

The production design of KAMIKAZE 1989 makes Fassbinder's own QUERELLE look positively ascetic and black-and-white in comparison.

This is real film-making. Cinema of excess starring that Europe's unstoppable film monster, Rainer Werner Fassbinder. A film that freely gambles and, most of the time, fails and still somehow remains worthwhile. 
KAMIKAZE 1989 is sort of an update on Godard's ALPHAVILLE.Or a kitschy companion piece to BLADERUNNER, if you prefer. Fassbinder, playing an alcoholic policeman in Germany's dystopian near future creates a likable, three-dimensional character who happens to live in a cartoonish world. 
In terms of coherent storytelling KAMIKAZE 1989 is a disaster. It's as if they omitted (or didn't film at all) some vital scenes, the story seems to skip and lose focus. I've had the source novel for years, perhaps it's the time I read it. That could help make sense of the incoherent story. 


Learn more about KAMIKAZE 1989 here.

Below are some grabs of Fassbinder as lieutenant Jansen and his magnificent leopard outfit. Enjoy!

possible of the impossible : Godard's NOTRE MUSIQUE (2004)

If you've seen any post-1968 Godard, you'll feel at home with NOTRE MUSIQUE.
Lack of story, suspence, action. Bare ideas.
Familiar didactic offscreen commentary.
That deliberate editing (anti-editing?) which is not building up an illusion of fluid continuity and seamless cuts but violently clashing images and sound.
To destroy, disembowel traditional narrative.

Grainy B/W newsreel footage VS oversaturated, fuzzy video.


Silence VS music.


No matter how much JLG pisses me off,I always find myself coming back for more.
A couple of weeks back I was left very frustrated with FILM SOCIALISME(this film was clearly designed to frustrate). Still, I was drawn to more Godard. NOTRE MUSIQUE is perfectly bearable (compared to FILM SOCIALISME) and very nice to look at.


Forget APOCALYPCE NOW. When it comes to cinematic war atrocities, Godrad's your man!
He clearly  knows how to pile on amazing stock footage from various sources to create an operatic, confusing, almost orgasmic collage of explosions and corpses.

Despite the grim subject matter, NOTRE MUSIQUE is not depressing and very easy on the eyes.

I would definitely recommend it over such  reasonably well-known stuff as WEEKEND(1967) PASSION (1982) or the overlong HISTOIRE(S) DU CINEMA (1988-1998)

bewildering and atmospheric: THE CATALYST

Jerome is a painter. He's eager to express pain and suffering on canvas. So eager that he chooses to cause/experience real violence in order to channel it into his work. His loved one falls victim to his obsession and soon other people who get exposed to Jerome's work begin to lose lives unable to cope with the anguish he so powerfully portrayed.

the happy couple

THE CATALYST is a recent short by Kidderminster-based filmmaker Thomas Lee Rutter (his brother Andrew John Rutter is also a filmmaker, the author of STATICA).
Recently I received a screener DVD entitled Quadro Bizarro which contains 4 short films including THE CATALYST. At about 17 minutes, THE CATALYST is quite tight and barrages the viewer with beautiful, grainy and at times surreal images. The creepy narration helps shape the unusual but vaguely connected scenes into a coherent whole.

 A cameo by the director himself (left)

The cast features Rutter's frequent collaborators Luke Coates (SHOE) and Corina Harper (A CHILD'S TOY).

Jerome and his work

I suppose it would be appropriate to bitch a little about the technical shortcomings of THE CATALYST. But I won't. Fuck it. If you want big explosions and well-recorded live sound you don't delve into UK no-budget DV filmmaking scene. And you don't come to blogs like TRASHFILMADDICT. You get my point.

 As usual, camera loves Luke Coates

There are moments in THE CATALYST which feel like pure Jean Rollin, others reminded me of American experimental cinema. But on the whole this is 100% Thomas Lee Rutter.
The music is effective and appropriate. Some of the cold electronic stuff made me think of Giovanni Cristiani's work for Fulci's DEMONIA (1990). But again, these are merely my associations.
What you get here is quality self-produced unusual stuff.

HALLOWEEN meets SUSPIRIA? 

THE CATALYST exists because Thomas Lee Rutter wanted it to. 
This is not a crowd-pleaser. It's a film that a man has made first of all for himself.
Not to win over financial backers or to gain commercial profit.
Depending on how tired you are of current studio product, THE CATALYST may strike you as either too rough or highly promising. If you liked the screengrabs I suggest you see for yourself.


Thomas Lee has recently started his own blog Carnie film production which covers his newest, most eccentric output.