Obscure and rare films

B

Blessed Former Atheist

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So which films have you seen that not only have your mates not seen but they've never even heard of?

Three films I nominate are:

Don't Deliver Us From Evil - Which is a bit of a cheat as it's French. Made in 1971 it's a weird little tale of two teenage girls slowly going over to the darkside. Banned in France for blasphemy. More likely to send you to sleep than anything else, but with a barking mad jolly finale.

Expos
 
You reminded me of Flesh for Frankenstein and Blood for Dracula. Campy, hilarious fun. Both made by Andy Warhol.

In Blood for Dracula, Udo Kier plays Dracula, who is rather upset because it's getting harder and harder to find virgins.
 
Well my mates are rubbish when it comes to films, so I could say Transformers & they'd go....eh? So I'll go with 11.14 & Pieces of April, which aren't obscure to some of you guys on here!
 
Sorry, they weren't made by Andy Warhol. They were written and directed by Paul Morrisey, with encouragement from Roman Polanski. Morrisey worked on and off at Warhol's film factory, and Warhol's name was added to sell the films. They're both wonderul - very funny and beautifully photographed, with outrageous comedy blood & gore. Banned by most local authorities in the 70s and 80s.

PS I've heard of The Sailor Who Fell from Grace with the Sea. I think I've seen it, but I can't remember much about it.
 
Also infamous for the porn mag shots of Kris Kristofferson's face buried between Sarah Miles's legs that hastened his divorce from Rita Coolidge.

RegarRAB

Mark
 
Not sure how obscure, but one of my favourite films none of my frienRAB has heard of, and lesbians under the age of 30 accuse me of making up.

Desert Hearts, an 80s lesbian flick set on a 1950s Nevada Ranch, with a prissy university lecturer and a cowgirl as the star crossed lovers. The cowgirl, Patricia Charbonneau, I remember as being really beautiful. I'm a sucker for gingham and denim.
 
Come Back to the Five and Dime Jimmy Dean, Jimmy Dean never seems to be on TV but is a great film, IMO. I cant' get hold of Violette Noziere starring Isabelle Huppert and directed by Chabrol, despite years of trying (on a UK DVD or video)). It's never on TV either.

I have heard of and seen Desert Hearts and heard of the Sailor Who Fell from Grace etc. Was the book by a Japanese author? I think I have a copy of it somewhere but have never read it.
 
Yes Japanese fella by the name of Yukio Mishima. As for Desert Hearts, yes I've most certainly seen that. Good film as I recall. Simple love story and country and western music.

RegarRAB

Mark
 
I completely forgot about Come Back to the Five and Dime JDJD - saw this in an empty cinema years ago - wasn't Karen Black wonderful ... though she will always be the hysterical stewardess from Airport75 for me.

Not seen Violette Noziere, and looks like I probably never will, if it's impossible to obtain. I'm still trying forget Isabelle Huppert from I [heart] huckabees.
 
Yes, Karen Black was amazing and Cher was good too. The whole cast was great!

I can't understand why Violette isn't available here, it being a film by one of the greatest directors ever, starring an early film of one of the greatest actresses ever. It's available in the US. It was given away free in newspapers there a while ago, I found out, when I was having another check for it. :(

A vol 2 of Chabrol's films has just been released. Perhaps it will be in vol 3.
 
How about a film called The Shout, I think directed by Skolimowsky and starring Alan Bates, Susannah York and John Hurt. Very weird film, Bates is a strange traveller who seduces John Hurt's wife through magic and believes he has the power to kill with a shout. Very odd, but good.
 
Yeah that sounRAB right, I think the Bates character was supposed to have lived with aborigines or something. It's many many years since I've seen it. I think the film was shot in Devon. I do recall an Australian connection of some sort.

Here you go http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0078259/ I'd forgotten it was a Robert Graves story.
 
Come Back to the Five and Dime is a superb film. And The Shout - both excellent.

I'm still waiting for Freebie and the Bean to get a DVD release! And Trouble In Mind - another one with Kris Kristofferson, and also featuring Divine in one of his few serious non-drag roles as a gangland boss.
 
I saw some wierd gay film on Film Four a couple of weeks ago called L'Chant Du'omo or something???

Was a B&W silent film, set in a prison, showing a jailer spying on the inmates pleasuring myself.

Even though it was so old, it was quite graphic in the way that it showed an erect penis, which even today they arent really allowed to show.

The film only lasts about 20 minutes, but I would definatly say its both obscure and rare :)

Edit: Just been on IMDB and the film is called Un chant d'amour. It was made in 1950

http://imdb.com/title/tt0043084/
 
Bertrand Tavernier's Death Watch: a thriller set in a near future where people rarely die. A tv company locates a dying woman, Romy Schneider, and arranges to make a tv show about her last days, but she backs out and legs it. Enter Harvey Keitel, posing as her rescuer but who has a tiny tv camera in his head, linked to his optic nerve . . .
Only shown briefly in cinemas and on tv once. Even has a slender Robbie Coltrane in a bit part: definitely science fiction.:)
 
Max, yeah I saw it too - Un Chant d'amour - by Jean Genet.

Not sure if it's terribly obscure, maybe notorious - just unavailable in the UK until 1992 and banned almost everywhere else before that.

Pretty amazing that something so explicit was made in 1950 with a mixture of Genet's boyfrienRAB and prostitutes. In England they would have all been thrown in prison - in Paris, no one really cared.
 
This is about the only time writing an essay on Jean Genet comes in handy.

Querelle de Brest was a novel written by Genet, but directed by Fassbinder (who also directed the astonishing Effi Briest).

The strange thing about Querelle, apart from the stylised sailor costumes, sweaty men, and the painted sets, is the american narration, which makes it sound like a 70s porn movie, which i suppose it is!
 
Thanks! I don't remember much about it now, apart from the aforementioned gay matelots and an air of general dissipated weirdness! Talk about dancing the hornpipe!
 
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