Word: weir
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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Much the same disease of overambition has quite clearly seized Peter Weir, director of the latest from Hollywood on Southeast Asia, The Year of Living Dangerously. In fact, one is struck by the general stylistic similarities between Apocalypse and this account of a journalist's adventures in 1965 Indonesia. The garbled plot; the unfocused, almost dream-like effect of the storyline: the infuriating sense of deeper meaning--these tell-tale syptoms of Coppolitis ooze through the seams of this beautifully filmed pastiche of Asia...
...Living Dangerously is more than just a pictorial guidebook to Asia. Despite its Apocalypse-like teetering on the absurd. Weir's film packs an allure beyond its surface appeal--a seamy romance and political intrigue set to the backdrop of Sukarno's raging Indonesia of the 1960s...
...YEAR OF LIVING DANGEROUSLY Directed by Peter Weir Screenplay by David Williamson, Peter Weir and C.J. Koch
...Peter Weir, the first Australian director to make an international name for himself, has chosen to steer a course that is at once more cautious and more daring. He has taken MGM/UA's largesse to mount a more elaborate version of the theme that solders his five earlier films: the collision between British culture and anarchic nature, a conflict that virtually defines the Australian experience. The scene is Indonesia in 1965, as the Sukarno government stumbles toward a coup that will eventually end the strongman's reign. In the streets, Communist marchers sing revolutionary songs with Whiffenpoof harmonies...
...Weir's movies have always boasted pristine imagery and avoided visual clichés; Picnic at Hanging Rock, The Last Wave and Gallipoli are among the smartest-looking pictures in recent cinema. But in his attempt to blend his preoccupations with the plot of C. J. Koch's 1978 novel, Weir has perhaps packed too much imagery and information into his movie. The sound track is wallpapered with dialogue and Billy Kwan's pensive narration. The plot becomes landlocked in true-life implausibilities; the characters rarely get a hold on the moviegoer's heart or lapels...