Much social realist.

This is very different from Clarke’s previous films… but it’s a new writer: Anthony Read, who’s written a lot of popular television, like Sapphire & Steel.

Janine Drzewicki’s performance in the lead role is something else… it’s fascinating. Riveting.

This is one of those movies where you appreciate that they didn’t actually use teenaged actors to play teenagers — that would have been abusive.

Then years pass! I didn’t really expect that!? But good.

That is the happiest baby I’ve ever seen.

Oh deer.

But oh whut oh right

That was an abrupt and unexpected ending, but also really appropriate?

Anyway, you could say that Janine Drzewicki carried this movie… but the cinematography is really interesting, and all these details in the sets… it’s just a really compelling little movie.

The vagueness is a bit … strange? But interesting.

Diane. Alan Clarke. 1975. ⚄

OK, here’s a movie I have no recollection of buying, but based on the time stamp of the rip, I guess it could be part of the Hazel Flagg collection? Doesn’t look like a typical movie, though. Is this some kind of 90s high school comedy?

Yeah, I… I think I’ve got the wrong movie? Perhaps I bought something that had a similar name and I was sent this?

No, I have apparently never bought this movie, or anything that sounds anything like this movie? So somebody sent me a random DVD when I bought something else?

But this is apparently a parody of spy movies and stuff?

They had impressive food on first class in the 90s, eh? Eh?

Hey, it’s what’s her name!

This movie has a lot of familiar faces…

And now it’s an explicitly 007 parody.

This is so silly… and it’s well made! I mean, the pacing is a bit off, but it’s like all the elements are there for a very funny movie. But it doesn’t quite work.

But it’s also kinda weird? Often the dialogue and the video don’t match up? Did they forget to record sound sometimes? I mean, it looks pretty good, so you’d think they’d got all the technical things under control… Was this produced by Golan-Globus? Was this made in Italy? It’s so odd.

Yeah, these are high school students. I forgot to mention that.

See? Production values!

But so odd! Why do they have this guy playing a high school student? And why have they put so much mascara on him? Why did they tweez his eyebrows that much?

It’s just weird. There must be a back story to this…

Well, that doesn’t explain it:

The film was shot at various locations in Montreal and La Malbaie, Quebec, Canada.

Right:

Dekker, who was only credited for the story in the released film, later stated that “The final product is not at all what I envisioned, not the least reason being they cast a ‘cool’ guy to play the nerdy lead, which kind of defeats the comedy.”

With a nerd in the lead, this would have made more sense.

But just look at this. How can you hate a movie that put an entire French class in a cage in a villain’s cave? I wish this movie was in 4K instead of on DVD. They put so much work into the visuals…

The villain is an EU enthusiast!

The cinematographer had so much fun…

This bombed at the box office for very good reasons.

And nobody much likes the movie, and I can’t disagree. It’s such a strange mix of ineptness and competence: The cinematography is pretty good, and there’s several good actors here… if you just look at a random scene (especially with the sound off) it looks really great. And! There’s several good gags. I laughed!

But it’s just wrong. The movie is made wrong.

So I can totally see that a reasonable score would be ⚀. But I enjoyed this movie — it’s just such a contrast watching this after watching modern greige TV shows, where everything looks like puke, and there’s no fun.

I wonder if Redlettermedia has covered this? Or MST3K? It’s such a fun, stupid movie that doesn’t quite work. This should be a cult movie.

(If somebody sent me this movie out of the blue (it wouldn’t be the first time), then: Thank you.)

If Looks Could Kill. William Dear. 1986. ⚃