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L'acte créateur is a gesture of abuse, says Abel Ferrara, something to be suffered by cast and crew and audience alike. The work in progress is titled The Mother of Mirrors, the auteur in the throes (Harvey Keitel) has a TV star (Madonna) to deal with. The drama follows imploding yuppie hedonists, the leading man (James Russo) adopts a Method approach for his character's viciousness. "He can't fucking act, man. He has to do everything for real." Performance and verity, rows staged for the camera continue in bedrooms, smudged divides are the norm. "You didn't fuck me, you fucked the girl in the script." Ferrara's Hollywood perdition, the collapsing sheen of film and the enveloping grain of video, a work of unrelenting laceration. The muse in her underwear, cf. Hawks' Twentieth Century, if urinating on the carpet is what it takes to get a reaction from her then so be it. The director cleans a bed rumpled with infidelity moments after his wife (Nancy Ferrara) and son arrive at the hotel room, his confession is an ill-timed urge in the wake of her father's death. Madonna à la Bardot in Le Mépris, "do the lines, you commercial piece of shit!" Los Angeles, adorned in neon or wrapped in smog, Civitas Dei/Civitas Diaboli. The scene calls for a knife at the actress' throat, the filmmaker yells "Cut!" and she gets nicked. "What kind of death are we talking about? Physical death only? There's a spiritual death also." Handel and rap, Bob Dylan's "Blue Moon." A métier of quarreling demons. Burden of Dreams is visible and Last Tango in Paris is indicated, Bergman's The Rite is brought to bear on the chimera of creativity and its dissipation. "This could be a good time to take off our sunglasses." The Blackout furthers the magnificent spiral. With Victor Argo, Christina Fulton, Glenn Plummer, Reilly Murphy, Annie McEnroe, and Richard Belzer.
--- Fernando F. Croce |