Lyrical and offbeat, cowriter-director Jim McBride’s
postapocalyptic saga Glen and Randa
offers a humanistic spin on a genre that’s normally marked by nihilism and
violence. Rather than imaginging a near-future Earth where survivors of a
cataclysm battle each other for dwindling resources, McBride posits a primitive
environment where the eradication of knowledge is the biggest danger to the
human race. The lead characters, hippie-ish teenagers Glen and Randa, are
introduced nude and in the wilderness, hitting the Adam and Eve allegory hard,
so the idea is that they’ve grown up as primitives without schools and other
social structures to shape their understandings. Glen has gleaned his sense of
the world from comic books that he (barely) reads, so he dreams of finding the
gleaming city of Metropolis, where everyone can fly. (Glen’s so beguiled by
power fantasies, in fact, that he shouts “Shazam!” whenever lightning strikes.)
After a long and largely wordless sequence of Glen and Randa cavorting in the
woods, the movie shifts to civilization, of a sort, when the young lovers join
an enclave of raggedy survivors who gather around a campfire and eat scraps.
Next, an old man known only as “The Magician” shows up, putting on a show
featuring a random assortment of gadgets from the technology era—a blender, an
record player, and even a fire-retardant suit. The Magician is a mile-a-minute
blabbermouth, but his connection to the old world fascinates Glen, who becomes
the Magician’s de facto assistant. (“You’re too good a man for slavery, Prince
Valiant,” the Magician says to Glen in a mishmash of highfalutin phraseology
and literary references. “I give you a quest.”) After Glen steals maps from the
Magician, he and Randa set out for their next adventure, even though Randa has
become pregnant. Finally, the duo falls into the orbit of Sidney Miller (Woody
Chambliss), a sweet old recluse living in woods by an ocean shore.
One could
argue that nothing much happens in Glen
and Randa, simply because McBride eschews the usual postapocalyptic tropes
(messanic characters, radiation, roving bands of savages, etc.). Yet the vibe
of the picture is strangely persuasive, and the specific choices that McBride
makes are interesting—for instance, the Magician plays a warped 45 of the
Rolling Stones’ “Time Is on My Side,” with the irony of that song in a
postapocalyptic context emerging gradually. Ultimately, Glen
and Randa is a strange little movie filled with connection and despair in
equal measure. FYI, although the film carried an “X” rating during its original
release, the only edgy material is nudity and some discreet sexuality.
Glen and Randa: GROOVY
Typical how if the movie was filled with over the top violence likely would have secured an "R' rating but because there was nudity it was slapped with an "X"
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