1984: The Year in Bedlam
Continuing with my Year in Bedlam year-end overviews, we arrive at 1984
1985: The Year in Bedlam
It makes sense that, in what is universally acknowledged as the worst-ever decade for film, the midpoint of that decade marks its low point
THE UNEASY
A surreal novella of a type that only England’s Eibonvale Press seems equipped to turn out
Brian De Palma’s Films, Ranked
Here we pay homage to one of screen’s pre-eminent visual stylists and most irrepressible troublemakers
THE OK DOLL
The idea of a man in love with a doll is hardly a novel one, but in this screenplay England’s Peter Greenaway creates a uniquely witty and perverse take on man-doll love
LOLA
A “lost” film in the filmography of Spain’s late Bigas Luna (1946–2013), LOLA is a 1986 erotic thriller that received very little attention and has largely vanished from sight
HASHISH
Germany’s premiere example of “drug writing,” 1902’s HASHISH by Oscar A.H. Schmitz appears here in its first ever English translation
ANAÏS NIN AT THE GRAND GUIGNOL
Yet another example of mislabeled literary horror
TWINS
You probably know this novel as the inspiration for David Cronenberg’s DEAD RINGERS (1988), which was a rare instance of a film adaptation surpassing its source novel
DIONYSUS: THE ULTIMATE EXPERIMENT
This book outlines a little remarked-upon but quite pertinent facet of space travel: sex in zero gravity