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<blockquote data-quote="Willie Oleson" data-source="post: 440655" data-attributes="member: 8">Martin (1977)[ATTACH=full]59142[/ATTACH]One of the most bizarre films I&#039;ve ever seen, and that&#039;s saying something.The story deals with vampirism in two different ways: a horny young virgin who may be suffering from iron deficiency (though the sex and blood appear to be connected), and the gothic-romantic version of Nosferatu.Additionally, the setup is ambiguous: where does Martin come from, to what extent does he consider his condition to be problematic, is it connected with the alleged crazy family history?This is happening in a place that is about to become a ghost town, and there&#039;s also a little bit of &quot;diary of a mad housewife&quot; in it.Honestly I found it impossible to connect the dots, but the film has a very alluring cinematography despite being made on a super-low budget.It&#039;s extremely &quot;new wave&quot; (was that still &quot;new&quot; in 1977?) and the unglamorous non-actors add a documentary feel to the production. I was often reminded of Todd Haynes&#039; Poison (1991) while I was watching Martin.The more action-packed sequences suffer the most from the limited budget and there&#039;s a lot of image-by-image editing to obscure it. Nevertheless, this seemingly unpolished technique makes it look excitingly raw and/or clumsily funny.The film&#039;s highlight is Martin&#039;s attack on an adulterous couple. The woman was supposed to be in bed alone which, at least, justifies the messy and improvisational proceedings.I prefer to take everything at face value, it&#039;s not my&nbsp;&nbsp; job to be informed, and if&nbsp;&nbsp; something allegorical bubbles to the surface, fine. Wonderful. It can also occur at a later time or because of someone else&#039;s interpretation, but I&#039;m not desperately looking for answers let alone while I&#039;m watching the story.And sometimes it&#039;s better not to know. I remember feeling disappointed after reading the perfect explanation of the religious symbolism in Mother!I really loved my uninformed, mind-boggling, exhaustingly frustrating experience, thinking it was all happening &quot;just because&quot;.Martin&nbsp;&nbsp; is a must-watch for 1970s completists or anyone with a penchant for cult films.Oh yes, the word &quot;penchant&quot; is all over the place right now, I suspect it&#039;s yet another discovery by the hipsters.But I do like the word and I hope to describe something or someone as &quot;a penchant for luncheon appointments&quot; in the foreseeable future.Lastly, while I was watching MARTIN it dawned on me that I was already familiar with the story of a young man believing to be a vampire, and I don&#039;t mean Nicolas Cage&#039;s Vampire&#039;s Kiss&nbsp; from 1988.Somehow I kept thinking of the name PATRICK therefore I looked it up to see if a film with that name exists and to find out if there&#039;s some connection.Well, it&#039;s real and it turns out to be an Australian horror film from 1978 but I don&#039;t think it has anything to do with vampires.Yootjoop has it, image presented in wrong aspect ratio. Should I.....?</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Willie Oleson, post: 440655, member: 8"] Martin (1977) [ATTACH type="full" alt="1780654572006.png"]59142[/ATTACH] One of the most bizarre films I've ever seen, and that's saying something. The story deals with vampirism in two different ways: a horny young virgin who may be suffering from iron deficiency (though the sex and blood appear to be connected), and the gothic-romantic version of Nosferatu. Additionally, the setup is ambiguous: where does Martin come from, to what extent does he consider his condition to be problematic, is it connected with the alleged crazy family history? This is happening in a place that is about to become a ghost town, and there's also a little bit of "diary of a mad housewife" in it. Honestly I found it impossible to connect the dots, but the film has a very alluring cinematography despite being made on a super-low budget. It's extremely "new wave" (was that still "new" in 1977?) and the unglamorous non-actors add a documentary feel to the production. I was often reminded of Todd Haynes' [I]Poison[/I] (1991) while I was watching Martin. The more action-packed sequences suffer the most from the limited budget and there's a lot of image-by-image editing to obscure it. Nevertheless, this seemingly unpolished technique makes it look excitingly raw and/or clumsily funny. The film's highlight is Martin's attack on an adulterous couple. The woman was supposed to be in bed alone which, at least, justifies the messy and improvisational proceedings. I prefer to take everything at face value, it's not [I]my[/I] job to be informed, and [I]if[/I] something allegorical bubbles to the surface, fine. Wonderful. It can also occur at a later time or because of someone else's interpretation, but I'm not desperately looking for answers let alone while I'm watching the story. And sometimes it's better not to know. I remember feeling disappointed after reading the perfect explanation of the religious symbolism in [I]Mother![/I] I really loved my uninformed, mind-boggling, exhaustingly frustrating experience, thinking it was all happening "just because". [I]Martin[/I] is a must-watch for 1970s completists or anyone with a penchant for cult films. Oh yes, the word "penchant" is all over the place right now, I suspect it's yet another discovery by the hipsters. But I do like the word and I hope to describe something or someone as "a penchant for luncheon appointments" in the foreseeable future. Lastly, while I was watching MARTIN it dawned on me that I was already familiar with the story of a young man believing to be a vampire, and I don't mean Nicolas Cage's [I]Vampire's Kiss[/I] from 1988. Somehow I kept thinking of the name PATRICK therefore I looked it up to see if a film with that name exists and to find out if there's some connection. Well, it's real and it turns out to be an Australian horror film from 1978 but I don't think it has anything to do with vampires. Yootjoop has it, image presented in wrong aspect ratio. Should I.....? [/QUOTE]

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Who played JR Ewing?