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The serene tragedy of the dildo that fancies itself a wand. "You got scruples now, huh?" Los Angeles on the cusp of the Eighties, all glossy surface, just the territory for the hustler convinced of his own purity (Richard Gere). One must dress the part so he spreads his Armani suits and ties on his bed like a painter mixing colors, on the soundtrack Smokey Robinson states the mission: "Oh you gave the illusion that your love was real..." The body is available for rental to a line of socialites, the senator's wife (Lauren Hutton) wants more and therein lies the problem. (Their sex scene is a dispassionate catalog of fleshy parts, cf. Godard's Une Femme mariée.) Next to the Neon Sodom of Hardcore, Paul Schrader's city this time is a netherworld of pastels, an advertisement for vacant luxury, calm and sad. High class and rough trade, politicians and whores, the complicated art of a matron's orgasm. A murder case, plus an Inspector Porfiry (Hector Elizondo) with cigar and a hint of envy. "You seem like a young man who needs a little self-improvement." Slow tracking shots are prevalent, Blondie's "Call Me" is a morphing leitmotif à la The Long Goodbye. The madam (Nina van Pallandt) presides over a golden beach, the pimp (Bill Duke) luxuriates in the subterranean blues of the queer nightclub, Warhol's torso posters adorn the latter's abode. "Something worthwhile" in the void? Coppola's The Conversation is brought to bear on the protagonist's paranoia over planted evidence, a high-angled view of the lush apartment desperately dismantled. "Take your pleasure when you can." Schrader hilariously compounds the perversity of the mannequin's ultimate conversion with the closing credits, Mozart filtered through Giorgio Moroder's synthesizers. Cinematography by John Bailey. With Brian Davies, Carole Cook, K. Callan, Tom Stewart, Carol Bruce, and Frances Bergen.
--- Fernando F. Croce |