I started watching John Waters’ Cecil B. Demented (2000) on NYE 2017, and took a break, only getting time to finish it on Jan 2, so this was technically the first good movie I watched in 2018. Trashed by critics on release, recommended to me by my friend Clare Nina, this film is a gleeful, anarchistic cartoon of a ride, attacking mainstream Hollywood (its targets seem quite quaint in comparison to the hegemonic market place today) as the title character (Stephen Dorff) kidnaps a Hollywood starlet (Melanie Griffith) to help create a full scale attack on the studio system, all the while satirising film purists as Manson-esque terrorists. Co-stars the actual Patty Hearst and a young Michael Shannon is credited as “Mike Shannon”. Recommended.
VHS Tracking 