Bakshi at the Egyptian!
Ralph Bakshi in person at The Egyptian, April 29-May 1! The three nights of double features: Fritz the Cat/Heavy Traffic on Friday, Wizards/Coonskin(AKA Streetfight) on Saturday, Lord of the Rings/American Pop on Sunday, with a grab bag of shorts on both Friday and Saturday. I've allways loved Bakshi, even though almost all of his movies are complete messes. It's not just that I love animation, and I love the idea of adult themes being used in animation, but I love the specific style and feel of Bakshi's stuff. It's sexy, sweaty, it's of a piece with the cinema of the 70s, and yet...cooler. It's just right, everything I love about cartoons translated into transgressive film. I've been wanting to go back and reassess his body of work, so this gives me a perfect opportunity.
The obvious thing to do would be to check out LotR/American Pop, neither of which I've ever seen. I'm not gonna, though. I have a mild curiosity about his LotR, but I'm sure it's pretty terrible, and that screening will probably be overflowing with Tolkien geeks anyway. I'm planning on going to both the Friday and Saturday screenings, even though that's alot of movie to sit through.
Fritz the Cat is one of my favorite movies of all time. I've been listing it in my top 10, and I think at one time I even had it as my #1. I really believe this movie gets the shaft, as most people view it as one juvenile joke (cartoon characters indulging in sex, drugs, violence and profanity) stretched out for two hours. Too me, it's a great story about a young guy going out on the road to find adventure and figure out who he is, like Huck Finn. The cynical view of the counterculture is a stark contrast to the hippie films of only a few years earlier, and I'd go so far as to say that this is my favorite film about the 60s generation--surely alot better than that bore of a film, Easy Rider. And the stony animation is just fantastic.
On the other hand, I haven't seen it since...I guess around '92. It's reall due for a reevaluation, and I'm starting to doubt it's place on my top 10. Just as, several years ago, I had to admit that I was just too old to have Pink Flamingos in my top 10, I'm wondering if it's not a more juvenile film than I remember.
Heavy Traffic and Street Fight I saw once each, in high school, and thought they were both pretty neat, but incoherent messes. It will be interesting to see how they feel now. And Wizards I saw multiple times through college, and liked quite a bit, but for some reason I have a distinct feeling that this is going to come off boring now. But they're also showing the "Night of the Bat-Bat" episode of New Adventures of Mighty Mouse. God, I love that show, and I haven't seen an episode since college!
The obvious thing to do would be to check out LotR/American Pop, neither of which I've ever seen. I'm not gonna, though. I have a mild curiosity about his LotR, but I'm sure it's pretty terrible, and that screening will probably be overflowing with Tolkien geeks anyway. I'm planning on going to both the Friday and Saturday screenings, even though that's alot of movie to sit through.
Fritz the Cat is one of my favorite movies of all time. I've been listing it in my top 10, and I think at one time I even had it as my #1. I really believe this movie gets the shaft, as most people view it as one juvenile joke (cartoon characters indulging in sex, drugs, violence and profanity) stretched out for two hours. Too me, it's a great story about a young guy going out on the road to find adventure and figure out who he is, like Huck Finn. The cynical view of the counterculture is a stark contrast to the hippie films of only a few years earlier, and I'd go so far as to say that this is my favorite film about the 60s generation--surely alot better than that bore of a film, Easy Rider. And the stony animation is just fantastic.
On the other hand, I haven't seen it since...I guess around '92. It's reall due for a reevaluation, and I'm starting to doubt it's place on my top 10. Just as, several years ago, I had to admit that I was just too old to have Pink Flamingos in my top 10, I'm wondering if it's not a more juvenile film than I remember.
Heavy Traffic and Street Fight I saw once each, in high school, and thought they were both pretty neat, but incoherent messes. It will be interesting to see how they feel now. And Wizards I saw multiple times through college, and liked quite a bit, but for some reason I have a distinct feeling that this is going to come off boring now. But they're also showing the "Night of the Bat-Bat" episode of New Adventures of Mighty Mouse. God, I love that show, and I haven't seen an episode since college!
posted by Chris Oliver at 9:38 AM
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