Variety

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Chris F Variety was striking in so many ways for me. The nostalgia of youth and living away from home and trepidatious first steps as an independent person are Variety’s main concerns. The limitless opportunities that become available when first striking out as a fully fledged adult. Watching became voyeuristic. The lead character and filmmakers’ points of view became my own as one long take gave way to another and allowed me the space to take everything in. Tom Dicillo’s photography is especially good and makes a shoestring budget look like a million bucks on the screen. This movie is a slow burn. A character study. A patient look at a very inequitable NYC in the early 1980s. This is a coming of age story without all the pop music and malls. I loved it. Rated 4/5 Stars •  Rated 4 out of 5 stars 12/23/24 Full Review KARL O I cannot say it is the worst movie ever made, I have not seen every movie. I can say its amongst the worst I have ever seen. Tomorrow I plan on painting my bathroom wall and watching it dry for something a bit more lively. I also think the wall will give a better lead performance. Rated 1/5 Stars •  Rated 1 out of 5 stars 07/08/24 Full Review Petros T It mostly runs on the mysterious vibe and messaging yet falls short. The sequences where Christine follows Louie around are intriguing, though they're dragged out and repeated enough to lose some of their power by the end. And that's probably the film's biggest detriment: it's largely nerveless, doubtlessly overlong and overall rather boring. On the bright side, the acting is good, there are some funny bits (Jose works as the comic relief), and even the ridiculously abrupt finale is justifiable. Rated 2.5/5 Stars •  Rated 2.5 out of 5 stars 10/04/23 Full Review Audience Member Sex, sleaze, and corruption served up feminist style in early 80s New York and ... Asbery Park. Our heroine finds herself drawn to porn and corruption because of her last-chance job as a ticket clerk in an adult movie theater back when there was such a thing. It attracts notice because of its feminist tone and take on unlikely themes for a woman especially at that time. But its effect is dulled by confusing and overly long diversions - such as our heroine reciting a complete pornographic story to her boyfriend while he plays a pinball machine and drinks beer for the duration. Johnny C. sez come for the feminist psychology and stay for the sleaze. Rated 2.5/5 Stars •  Rated 2.5 out of 5 stars 02/17/23 Full Review Audience Member Bette Gordon is great at capturing those private moments in public spaces and personal moments in private spaces. She really lets the action play out and keeps the frame wonderfully engaged without significant cutting around. There is always tension, there is always something going on. Everything was insanely interesting and charged with thriller like intensity without the falsity. What a way to end the movie, with an unfulfilled promise, the way porn ends, with all fantasy and no physical resolution or satisfaction. Rated 5/5 Stars •  Rated 5 out of 5 stars 02/19/23 Full Review Audience Member Variety is an important film for many reasons. It explores detachment, boredom, and voyeurism in ways rarely shown in a movie. The story centers around Christine (Sandy McLeod) taking a job selling tickets at a NYC porn theater, and how her life is slowly transformed by the people, environment, and culture as a whole. Lesser films have mined similar territory by focusing on women "unlocking their sexual desires" and invariably deteriorating into soft core titillation. Variety ends up closer to Susan Seidelman's Smithereens or Desperately Seeking Susan than late night cable fare. Slapping the term "feminist" on a film can be frustratingly non-specific, but Variety is told from a certain "feminine" point of view, and how a woman can feel and act when placed in a certain situation. Christine is operating on instinct and impulse; letting the new world around her change how she interfaces with her old life and how she views herself. Fascinating not only for the stark NY/NJ street scenes circa 1983, but how the director Bette Gordon reveals a character study of someone whose actions some of us may not relate to, but whose willingness to give into self-exploration wherever that road may lead is thought provoking nonetheless. Rated 4/5 Stars •  Rated 4 out of 5 stars 02/01/23 Full Review Read all reviews

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