Wednesday, May 30, 2012

LAST CHANTS FOR A SLOW DANCE (DEAD END): FIXIN' TO DIE



Right up front, it should be understood that Jon Jost's 1977 deconstruction of the road movie, Last Chants for a Slow Dance (Dead End), nudges the viewer to abandon the need to know where the story is heading for most of the film.  Sure, there are familiar signposts and very subtle hints at genre conventions; at times, it appears as if we might be moving into territory once mined by Monte Hellman, but Jost isn't as interested in sustaining an existentially-flavored narrative or tone as much as he is in offering up a character piece that doesn't rely on the safety of a three-act structure.  Produced for only $2000, Slow Chants is a film like no other, a reminder that cinema doesn't always have to embrace the all-too-common formalism of the mainstream to successfully relay a story.




Jost introduces us to Tom (Tom Blair), a man on the road with the expressed goal of finding employment.  Except, he's really not looking for a job.  He complains about his wife (Jessica St. John), his kids ("I never wanted kids") and his duty to them, never once acknowledging that there might have been choices that lead him to this reality.  Although the journey is necessitated by his familial responsibilities, Tom mostly uses it to free himself of them, drifting aimlessly away from the orbit of those that need him the most, expressing only disdain for them when he can be troubled to acknowledge their existence at all.




There's an episodic quality to the situations that Tom wanders through, whether it be time spent drinking at a bar, a conversation with a hitchhiker, or an encounter with a man on the side of the road.  Jost stitches these moments together with stubbornly static, visual compositions (of the road, an abandoned storefront, clouds, etc.) and sustained fades to black, pulling the audience into a disjointed fugue that reflects the protagonist's lost meanderings through an undefined landscape.  At times, it's easy to forget the few details we've gleaned thus far, as Jost invites us to watch as Tom flips through a stack of postcards in real time, for instance.

All of which sounds like a recipe for a film lacking meaning; an assessment that couldn't be further from the truth.  The last scene of the film; the one that comes after the film's most shocking (and, yet, still emotionally numbed) sequence, provokes one to reassess the entire piece based on what we've just witnessed.  It plays out as a clear-eyed, glorious end to an otherwise elliptical portrait of a sociopath.






Last Chants for a Slow Dance (Dead End) plays at the NW Film Center's Whitsell Auditorium (in the Portland Art Museum) on Thursday, May 31st at 7pm.  Jost's Parable (2008) follows at 9pm.  Additional information on the screening available here.

On Sunday, June 3rd, two more films by Jost, The Long Shadow (La Lunga Ombra) and Images of a Lost City will screen at 6:30pm and 8:15pm, respectively.  More info available here.

Jon Jost will be in attendance for all four screenings.  He's also leading a workshop on digital production on June 2nd and 3rd.


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SOMETIMES A GREAT NOTION @ THE HOLLYWOOD THEATRE



Paul Newman's film adaptation of Ken Kesey's great Northwestern logging strike tale, Sometimes a Great Notion, returns to the Hollywood Theatre this weekend for a limited, 4-day run.  Starring Newman, Henry Fonda and Lee Remick, it's a chance to see a rarely screened, regionally-filmed classic; the only known 35mm print in existence will light up the big screen at the Hollywood.  Given how tossed off the dvd version of this title is (it's been relegated to the made-to-order, dv-r "Universal Vault Series"), you practically owe it to yourself to check this out this weekend.






Sometimes a Great Notion plays at the Hollywood Theatre on Friday, June 1st through Monday, June 4th.  More info available here.

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