Lunatics: A Love Story (1991) скачать в хорошем качестве

Lunatics: A Love Story (1991)

Josh Becker's cult screwball romance starring Ted Raimi, Deborah Foreman, and Bruce Campbell. This took me forever to find. The young Raimi plays Hank, a man with an unnamed mental disorder that causes paranoid hallucinations; he has not left his apartment in six months. Deborah Foreman is a Nancy, a girl who just arrived in L.A. with her jerk of a boyfriend, Ray (Bruce Campbell). After being robbed and ditched by Ray, Nancy wanders the streets, until being accosted by a gang of awful racist caricatures (they literally plan to gang r*pe her because they "didn't find any crack tonight." Yeesh). Hank misdials while calling a party line (these were like analog Tinder; you'd call in to a shared phone number and talk with strangers about a shared interest, usually sex) and accidently reaches the phone booth Nancy is hiding in. He offers his place as shelter. Laughs and love ensue. Overall, I think it's a pretty decent movie. Shot in 1989 but held for release for two years, it's clearly made on the cheap, yet the direction is dripping with style. You can clearly tell that Josh Becker grew up with Sam Raimi and that whole Michigan Mafia crew. Unlike a lot of Raimi's work from the time, Becker tends to infuse his work with heart. Yes, this is a somewhat surreal screwball comedy with plenty of slapstick, but that's really just garnishing to a story about two lonely people finding each other and overcoming their problems to help the other. A similar dressed-up sentimentality is present in Becker's follow-up film, Running Time, where a story that starts out feeling like a fairly solid, if somewhat generic, Tarantino-style heist-gone-wrong film becomes a story about reconnecting with lost love and looking back on the mistakes you've made. Joseph LoDuca also provides a killer jazz score; in some places, it really reminded me of Howard Shore's score for Naked Lunch, although this movie was made first (and for a fraction of the budget!). As far as this movie is concerned, my only major gripe is with the pretty bad racial depictions. Like I said, the gang is made up of one-dimensional racial stereotypes (although it is made up of both black and Hispanic members so, um... progress?), and there's a black neighbor in the apartment complex who's big comedic scene is over the top fear that comes dangerously close to the old Stepin' Fetchit style bit. And let's not forget Hank's recurring hallucinations of a rap trio who torment him. I'm not saying Josh Becker is a racist person or that this film is some kind of hate-screed; it isn't. I just think we should acknowledge when media, intentionally or not, perpetuates negative stereotypes. If this ruins the movie for you, I won't blame you for clicking away, however, I personally found it to be a fun and heartwarming movie, regardless. If you like it, be sure to check out Running Time, also written/directed by Josh Becker and starring Bruce Campbell in a bank robbery story told entirely in real-time. If you want to see more work from the Raimi crew, I'd also look into the work of Scott Spiegel, who came up with all of them and has had a fairly steady career making stylish B-movies for over 30 years now. Oh, and in case it wasn't obvious, Bruce Campbell not only plays the jerk boyfriend, but also the crazed doctor; They can hide his chin, but that voice is just as iconic.