V Movie Reviews

Although Chisum stars John Wayne--playing a benign variation on his Red River empire-builder --he's curiously sidelined in this umpteenth retelling of Pat Garrett, William Bonney, and the Lincoln County War. Sam Peckinpah would direct the world-class version of that götterdämmerung, Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid, three years later. This version, directed by Andrew V. McLaglen in a slightly less broad vein than usual, is just odd--not least because it omits Garrett and Bonney's celebrated final confrontation. Geoffrey Deuel's Billy is a pleasant juvenile who scarcely seems delinquent, let alone murderously psychotic. Glenn Corbett's characterization of Garrett consists mainly of wearing a seriously BIG hat. There's an irksome rivalry for Chisum's perky niece (Pamela McMyler), and a Dominic Frontiere score that's the Western equivalent of elevator music. Chief scoundrel Forrest Tucker seems bored, but Christopher George, Richard Jaeckel, and Bruce Cabot get some juice into their villainy. --Richard T. Jameson

Leon Theremin was the secret link between sci-fi films, the Beach Boys, and Carnegie Hall. His self-named electronic musical instrument--the first of its kind--took the world by storm in the 1920s and '30s. Theremin: An Electronic Odyssey, winner of Sundance's Filmmakers Trophy, explores the inventor's strange life and times, including his mysterious 50-year disappearance beginning in the 1940s. Interviews with theremin virtuoso Clara Rockmore, synthesizer pioneer Robert Moog, and Theremin's contemporaries, as well as clips from movies such as The Day the Earth Stood Still, featuring the unworldly sounds of his creation, show an eccentric genius working toward success until his sudden vanishing in the Soviet Union. Footage of Theremin at 94 years old, finally rediscovered and rewarded for his achievements, brings a celebratory ending to what could be a grim or at least uncertain story, but instead is a fascinating documentary. --Rob Lightner

Lucy's never-ending quest to be an entertainer is spotlighted in these four episodes from December 1951 and January 1952. In "The Adagio," when Fred fails to teach Lucy to dance, a French partner leads to passes and dueling pistols. In "The Benefit," Lucy muscles in on Ricky's act for Ethel's club benefit, turning the tables on her husband during their vaudeville routine. Lucy gets tied up while babysitting bratty twins in "The Amateur Hour," but her nightmare turns into a coveted stage opportunity. In "Lucy Plays Cupid," her attempt to set up an elderly neighbor backfires when the intended falls for her instead. Her solution? A romantic dinner of sticky soup and steak requiring a chisel. Bonus footage includes the radio play of an episode of Lucille Ball's "My Favorite Husband," which inspired the "Cupid" script, as well as flubs and a behind-the-scenes featurette. --Kimberly Heinrichs

The second sequel to the hit Shaft, this film foreshadows itself early on when Shaft, asked to go undercover in Africa to halt modern-day slave trade, claims that he's not James Bond but strictly Sam Spade. Bond, however, is the operative model here, with John Shaft masquerading as an Ethiopian to infiltrate the slave business and bring it down. Yet everyone he encounters seems to know who he is and wants to kill him--but the string of dead bodies he leaves in his wake across two continents proves that no one is able to stop everyone's favorite hip private eye. Written by Stirling Silliphant, the film is long on action set pieces that are filmed with more energy than in Shaft's Big Score. Given contemporary practices involving smugglers of illegal Chinese and Mexican immigrants, the plot isn't all that far-fetched. Roundtree, as usual, is the picture of unflappable cool--but don't get him mad. --Marshall Fine

All singing! All dancing! All proletariat! Who knew the Soviets made musicals? The evidence is there in Dana Ranga's giddy documentary, which offers clips from dozens of musicals made between 1930 and 1970 from the Communist bloc. From rural Russian ditties with synchronized tractors and overall-clad farmers singing about the five-year plan to backstage melodramas and East German beach movies, this documentary reveals an entire hidden genre of Communist cinema. What makes them so fascinating is the Soviet bloc's uneasy truce with the musical, by its very nature a celebration of love and romance and plenty. How do to you turn that into a message of service and sacrifice? They tried, certainly--Stalin loved musicals--and throughout the 1930s and '40s Soviet studios created Busby Berkeley-like production numbers on assembly lines and sent field hands into song with synchronized pitchforks (no dancing allowed on the job, according to the censors) while harvesting their fields.

Later musicals show more cinematic sophistication and even a winking playfulness with the genre. The clips are marvelous--some surreal, some dynamic and delirious, and some simply absurd--but to Ranga they are more than simply kitsch. Interviews with the creators and the audiences of these films reveal how much these utopian bursts of energy and joy were treasured in dreary times. Ranga creates a nostalgia for a giddy, goofy genre that this country never even knew existed. Film history has rarely been so much fun. --Sean Axmaker