esrosedotblog

MOVIE MADNESS

Documentary about an obsessed and unskilled movie maker who specializes in horror films and recruits all his friends to support his 'habit'. It is one of those docs that makes me want to turn away and I cannot; a slow motion train wreck.

The makers of American Movie (1999) manage, somehow, to tread the narrow line between ridicule and plain story telling. In one way, the key players are pathetic losers. In another, they are doing the thing that you can only do in America (at least for now); chase a dream against all odds.

A lot of the early efforts of the film-maker are shown. They are all horror flicks; even when he was 12. There is one scene in a very early Super8 that shows a kid 'exploding'. My take is that if this guy did not make these movies, he would explode. All the violence and wildness in them would happen for real.

The interesting thing is that the film that he makes has sold some tapes, and there is an album! I figure he has made his nut. He is on his way to the next film.

Like I said, I couldn't turn away. It is worth a spin on the DVD if you are looking for the underbelly of auteur cinema. I am not sure how it made it on to the list of the NYTimes 1176 Best Films which is the way that I got to it; but there it is. I would guess because it is a film about film from a certain perspective; an antidote to mental illness, perhaps.

I will give it a 3 on the Netflix5 scale.