Sword of the Beast, The Day of the Locust, & Inserts

Sword of the Beast is another anti-Samurai film like Harakiri, although this doesn't work nearly as well. I was pretty confused during part of it, because I thought one guy was another. I think I probably should have just given up and tried rewatching it from the beginning, but I didn't enjoy it enough to do so. But it could just have been that the film itself doesn't tell you what the hell is going on until pretty far in, and it's only 85 minutes long, so it's just sort of confusing for more than half, and then it starts tossing a bunch of rapes in there. Oh, wait, there are rapes all over this film. I think every female character gets raped or sexually assaulted in some way. Maybe that had something to do with my disliking of the film. Sorry, Criterion, I didn't like your choice of this film.

The Day of the Locust would have worked better without Karen Black in it. I just got so annoyed by everything she did. And I didn't really care for any of the characters besides William Atherton, but that's mainly because he's the only relatively sensible person in the entire film. Plus, it was long and Donald Sutherland played a character named Homer Simpson who was a religious nut. And the use of songs also grated on my nerves. I had this feeling that the last scene would have some type of effect on my ability to sleep, but nope, creepy people in white masks just aren't scary. You hear me, Michael Myers? I'm not afraid of you.

Inserts allows me to add a new actress to the list of Good Actresses Whose Labia I've Seen: Veronica Cartwright. Well, at least I think I saw it, it was pretty hairy, you know, down there. So that makes it four: Veronica Cartwright, Holly Hunter, Jenny Agutter, and Toni Collette. And, this made these two films into a mini-Golden age of Hollywood as seen through the filter of the decadent 70s (with references to Clark Gable) minifest. I foresee quite a few more of these little links in weeks to come. Inserts felt just like a play, with an establishing shot of the only actual set (besides the screening of the stag film that opens the film), but infinitely dirtier than anything I saw on stage. Well, actually I did see Metamorphoses in Cincinnati, and that included full frontal male nudity (which shocked the audience, but really, it wasn't like it was enormous or anything), and an actress who, unfortunately, ended up wearing a very short skirt (but panties) and facing in my direction quite often. I felt fairly uncomfortable, because I was basically at her crotch height for most of it, and if it wasn't eye contact, it was panty contact. Which is a lot funnier if you misinterpret that. It was a good play, though, as I'm a total mythology nerd. Anyway, Dreyfuss, Cartwright, Hoskins, and Harper were all quite good, but Stephen Davies just was eh. And the story itself was also eh, as it was about a former great director who couldn't make the transition to sound films, and then starts to make porn in his house with a heroin addict and a completely naive guy with Hoskins as the money behind it all, and Harper as the wanna-be starlet who doesn't know what inserts are. But the nudity was extensive and pretty much constant. And how can you go wrong with that? I'm still not sure if it was artish porn or pornish art, but either way, I've seen Veronica Cartwright's hoo-ha.