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Last week's Movie Quiz winners

Filed under: Imported

I was happy to see so many correct answers to last week's quiz, especially since it's such an unseen, if not unknown film. Superstar: The Karen Carpenter Story (1987) was director Todd Haynes's second film, and there's more creativity and genuine emotion in its 43 minutes than most Oscar nominees from any year you choose.

The rise and fall of '70s America's singing sweetheart is dramatized using Barbie dolls (and excellent voice acting) interspersed with mock educational-film segments on anorexia nervosa. As Karen succumbs to the disease, her Barbie is horribly whittled down to size, and the filmmaking becomes increasingly distorted and frightening, with scenes made even more harrowing by inventive manipulation of The Carpenter's best-known themes (the opening of "We've Only Just Begun" slowed down to a haunting minor key drip-drip-drip is a standout, as is a noisy collage near the very end that simulates too well her agonized mental state). It's a miniature tour de force, if such a thing can exist, and raises many uncomfortable questions about American values and notions about beauty.

(It's no wonder, then, that the film has been supressed almost since its debut by legal action from both Mattel and Carpenter's brother Richard. The latter's injunction against the film was, for the record, because Haynes used numerous recordings by the duo without permission, but one can't help wondering if the real reason was the way he was portrayed-- callous, bullying-- as well as to a not-too-subtle inference about his "private life".)

So congratulations and a big sha-la-la-la-la to the following: Wayne A. Palmer, TCB, Chuck Tomlinson, Peter at Mudville Magazine, E. "Electro" Yarber, Michael Oleksyn, Kika Warner, Hank Parmer, and Keith Bailey at Unknown Films.

Usually, here at the Monday Movie Quiz, we're unable to give our winners anything other than the grand glory of seeing their names in blog-print, but not this time. With only a couple of exceptions, every winner expressed a yearning to actually see this film, as well as sadness that they feared they never would. Well, as we all know, the Internet is a wonderful place, and the entire 43-minute movie can be viewed or downloaded (recommended) at a website called Illegal Art. Scroll down, click, and enjoy one of the most inventive motion pictures ever made.

Posted by Steve Monaco at October 20, 2003 6:43 PM

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