ustxtxb_obs_1986_06_27_50_00021-00000_000.pdf

.’.11 and Associates E El5 1117 West 5th Street Austin, Texas 78703 REALTOR Representing all types of properties in Austin and Central Texas Interesting & unusual property a specialty. 477-3651 R Send the Observer to name address it to a friend name address city state zip it into some sort of PBS mini-series for people who never tire of watching “The Making of M.A.S.H.” during pledge drives. On the big screen, Alda’s sitcom dialogue shrinks to idle chatter inflated with false hysterics. More importantly, his historian sees the filming of the Revolution as a matter of polite presentation of historical detail, like a recreation in a department store window. When the film-within-thefilm’s kid director protests that young audiences want to see movies which “defy authority, destroy property, and take people’s clothes off,” we are meant to sigh with weary resignation at the bad taste of the hoi polloi. The truth is that Alda needs a whole lot more bad taste, and a lot less liberal sanctimony, if he ever expects to do more than stroke his audience’s polite prejudices. He could learn a few lessons from let a fear of vulgarity stand in the way of the visual and mythic possibilities of film. That is the most obvious and major difference between movies and television films are larger than life, not smaller. And to see Masina and Mastroianni inhabit the myth of Rogers and Astaire, if only for a delicate moment amidst the drone of commercials and talking heads, is to have a taste of transcendence, one that television is simply not equipped to supply. As proof, the most startling piece of the festival was a short, Precious Images, produced by the Directors’ Guild of America for its anniversary: a six-minute anthology of cuts from no less than 400 films, Citizen Kane to Close Encounters. It is impossible to articulate the films as they fly by, yet the images themselves are burned into the imagination as clearly as Coleridge’s Xanadu. Movies are, no doubt, a kind of pipe dream, but in the right hands they can be made to wake the dreamers from the sleep of the ordinary world. city state zip 0 this subscription is for myself Ogift subscription; send card in my name $23 enclosed for a one-year subscription Obill me for $23 price includes $1.12 sales tat The Texas Observer 600 West 28th Austin, Texas 78705 Ziffilleca 2600 E. 7th St. Austin, Texas 477-4701 vegetarian food The family of Mrs. R. D. Randolph cordially invites all friends of the Texas Observer to a brunch in honor of the newly formed Frankie Carter Randolph Policy Center. It will be held in Austin at the home of John T. and Frances Neal, 4501 Ridge Oak Drive, on Sunday June 29th, from 10 to noon. One hundred dollar donation, tax deductible. For information call Billie Carr at the The Frankie Carter Randolph Policy Center is an arm of the Citizens Education Association, which is chartered by the state as an independent non-profit organization for educational purposes. The Policy Center, located in Houston, sponsors forums, workshops, and seminars. THE TEXAS OBSERVER 21