#ghislain uhry

[randomrichards]

BLACK MOON:

A strange detour

Leads girl to weird family

Twisted wonderland

[sesiondemadrugada]

Malevil (Christian de Chalonge, 1981).

[byneddiedingo]

Jane Fonda in Spirits of the Dead: Metzengerstein

Alain Delon in Spirits of the Dead: William Wilson

Terence Stamp in Spirits of the Dead: Toby Dammit

Spirits of the Dead (Roger Vadim, Louis Malle, Federico Fellini, 1968)

Metzengerstein Cast: Jane Fonda, Peter Fonda, James Robertson Justice, Françoise Prévost. Screenplay: Roger Vadim, Pascal Cousin, based on a story by Edgar Allan Poe. Cinematography: Claude Renoir. Production design: Jean André. Film editing: Hélène Plemiannikov. Music: Jean Prodromidès William Wilson Cast: Alain Delon, Brigitte Bardot, Renzo Palmer. Screenplay: Louis Malle, Clement Biddle Wood, based on a story by Edgar Allan Poe. Cinematography: Tonino Delli Colli. Production design: Ghislain Uhry. Film editing: Franco Arcalli, Suzanne Baron. Music: Diego Masson. Toby Dammit Cast: Terence Stamp, Salvo Randone, Annie Tonietti, Marina Yaru. Screenplay: Federico Fellini, Bernardino Zapponi, based on a story by Edgar Allan Poe. Cinematography: Giuseppe Rotunno. Production design: Piero Tosi. Film editing: Ruggero Mastroianni. Music: Nino Rota. Of the three short films based on Edgar Allan Poe stories collected here under the title Spirits of the Dead, only the third, Federico Fellini's Toby Dammit, a freewheeling version of Poe's "Never Bet the Devil Your Head," really works. Roger Vadim's Metzengerstein is simply cheesy, with his then-wife Jane Fonda sashaying around in supposedly period costumes that are designed to reveal as much flesh as possible. The casting of her brother, Peter, as the man she loves, is obviously there to elicit a frisson of some sort, but it doesn't. Louis Malle's William Wilson stuffs a little too much of Poe's doppelgänger fable into its confines, and despite the presence of a cigar-puffing Brigitte Bardot, manages to pull whatever punches the story may have had, ending up rather dull. But Toby Dammit is a small gem, a concentration of Fellini's usual grotesques and decadents into a bright satire on celebrity: It's almost impossible to watch another awards show without recalling Fellini's acid-bathed take on it. Only the conclusion of the film really retains much of Poe, which suggests that Vadim and Malle might have been better off devising contemporary riffs on the material, as Fellini does.

[costumeye]

Brigitte Bardot - Viva Maria 1965

Director: Louis Malle

Costume Designer: Ghislain Uhry