Word: cimino
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HEAVEN'S GATE Directed and Written by Michael Cimino...
Heaven's Gate is not "an unqualified disaster." Cimino has discovered that cameras move, so, unlike The Deer Hunter, his new movie isn't almost entirely composed of long and medium shots with the camera staring. There are some exhilirating, sweeping pans of the vast homestead and interesting tracking through the streets of Casper, Wyo. In two parallel scenes--a waltz in Harvard Yard (it's actually Oxford) at the beginning of the film and a party at the Heaven's Gate Skating Arena in Wyoming--Cimino's camera moves with a lovely, fluid grace, catching...
...exquisite cinematography of Vilmos Zsigmond enhances Heaven's Gate's bright moments. Cimino's most striking images of the Old West, shots of gunmen riding across the plain or through smoky streets, their long dustcoats flapping in the wind, have a haunting glow to them, a strange old photograph quality...
...film's performances were hurt by the re-editing. Brad Dourif, for instance, seems to be an important character, though he has only about a dozen lines and lots of close-ups; he's always standing around, looking important, but never really doing anything. Throughout the entire film, Cimino cuts away from key scenes before they seem even half over. It's like a two-and-a-half-hour-long coming attraction. We get only fragments of performances from fine actors like Christopher Walken, Isabelle Huppert, John Hurt, and Sam Waterston. And then there's Kris Kristofferson as James Averill...
...Michael Cimino will be lucky if he ever gets another job, perhaps not because his movie is terrible, but because it is so huge and terrible. The golden boy stands in shame. The kid had potential. He coulda been a contenda. And instead, he's a bum--with nothing to console him but his delusions of grandeur...