春宫妖姬

　　亚历斯和莎玛是一对年轻恋人，他们于前往波斯尼亚与赫塞哥维纳中心时车子抛锚在森林里，他们决定向附近的村庄求援。路上，巴尔干战乱的穆斯林幸存者莎玛，开始怀疑有神秘力量追高清在跟着他们，而自信、快乐的年轻欧洲人亚历斯，试图让莎玛甩开这些胡思乱想；但莎玛紧握着她的穆斯林护身符「哈麦利亚」不放，导致神秘力量从森林里逐渐浮现…

　　20世纪50、60年代，亨利·韦斯特博士（威廉·麦鲍瑟 William Mapother 饰）创建了灵学实验室阿提克斯研究所，针对超能力、透视、读心术、隔空取物等边缘学科展开研究。虽然遭遇了无数的挫折与嘲笑，但是韦斯特博士仍坚持不懈朝着目标前进。1975年，他的实验室因某起骗局而被迫关闭，就在此时一个略显神经质的女人朱迪思·温斯黛德（莱亚·吉斯特德 Rya Kihlstedt 饰）被送到实验室。她之前因伤而拥有了超能力，而其看似货真价实的超能力迅速令见多识广的科学家们大为折服。在这一过程中，朱迪思的能力不断加强，甚至已经到了失控的程度。　　这已远远超出了超能力的范畴，谜团背后恶魔的身影时隐时现……

 年轻的马里恩·克兰（珍妮特·利 饰）在Phoenix工作，深受老板洛厄里（沃恩·泰勒 饰）信任。男友萨姆·卢米斯（约翰·加文 饰）在Fairvale经营一家五金店，因要替亡父还债又要支付前妻赡养费而无力再婚，只能借出差的机会偶尔来与马里恩幽会。马里恩对此感到不满，于是在周五下午趁机携四万美元公款驾车潜逃。可是马里恩的潜逃之路并不顺利：先是在出城的时候被洛厄里目击，周六一大早又被警察怀疑。花了七百美元以旧车换新车之后，马里恩继续忐忑地行驶。入夜后，天降大雨，视线模糊，无法行驶，马里恩只得将车泊入路边的贝茨汽车旅馆投宿。老板诺尔曼（安东尼·珀金斯 饰）十分友善，试图邀请马里恩到家里共进晚餐，可惜被凶恶的母亲粗暴阻止，只得将晚餐端至旅馆客厅。马里恩在客厅一边进餐一边与诺尔曼交谈，终于决定周日返回Phoenix。用餐完毕，马里恩回房沐浴。这时，一个老妇的身影突然出现在卫生间……

　　Set in an underground dungeon inhabited by bundled, ragged human beings, after the nuclear holocaust. The story follows the wanderings of a hero through the situations of survival. People wait for the Ark to arrive and rescue them while their habitat falls apart.　　Delving deep into the dusty and long abandonded vaults of b-cinema in search of lost gems always leaves me with a bittersweet taste. On one hand the discovery of unexpected gems where no one would think them possible is a rewarding experience. On the other hand though it makes one wonder how many of these remarkable low-budget oddities, personal love affairs of directors never quite famous and now all but forgotten, have almost forever slipped from memory?　　n any case what we have here is a little post-apocalyptic gem from Poland that is really better than it has any right to. The dystopian near future of O-BI, O-BA finds a group of survivors of the nuclear war that ravaged the Earth inhabiting an underworld concrete bunker and biding their time as they wait for the mysterious Ark, an air ship of some kind that will come and save them. The Ark proves to be an elaborate hoax, carefully designed to give hope to the malnourished and desperate denizens of the bunker, while in the meantime the dome that separates their miserable existence from the nuclear winter outside is slowly caving in.　　What first striked me about the movie is the design of the bunker and the depiction of the survivors. The survivors are gaunt, filthy and terrible-looking penitents, dressed in rags and aimlessly wandering the neon-lit halls of the bunker like automatons. The bunker is a rundown, seedy place, with bright neon lights peering from all sides like the eyes of malignant beasts.　　On one hand it is a slightly 80's depiction of the dystopian future but the movie never stoops down to MAD MAX cheese. Instead it combines biting political satire with the bleak outlook of a world with no future, black comedy with barbs on apathy, religion and power. The survivors, for example, are fed some kind of flour dropping from a tube that hovers in the air - later on we discover the food supervisor uses books and the Bible itself as filler for this meagre meal. There are many such short symbolic touches, perhaps not life-changing or faith-restoring, yet playful, clever and inspired.　　One thing is for sure; O-BI, O-BA is not your run-of-the-mill sci-fi schlock. It overcomes its modest budget with creativity and has genuine artistic aspirations both from a writing and directing perspective. My opinion is that it should have been filmed in black and white instead of colour though. The director uses atmospheric light and shadow to great effect and it would have registered even better in stark black and white. The blue-green neon on the other hand outstays its welcome after a while. Just a minor gripe in an otherwise solid b-movie with its heart set in all the right places.　　Imagine a less bleak THE ROAD (Cormac McCarthy) being injected with the satire and humour of DR.STRANGELOVE and you're getting there. See it if you can find it.