The Pope of Greenwich Village (1984): review: unfinished film

Length of film: 121 minutes

Length tolerated before switch off: 54 minutes

Percentage suffered: 44.62%

Narcissistic Italian-American scoundrels in New York, more used to stealing from their catering employers, plan a robbery. They have various romantic complexities too.

This is a very sub-Scorcese picture with a lot of method style mannerisms, and observations of proletarian New Yorkers eating, drinking, walking about and being rude to each other.

Reason for switch off: the film dawdles hopelessly, unsympathetic characters, facing challenges of no consequence.

The acting is all good, but it is insufficent to hold against the films aimlessness. In addition, the characters are nearly all unplleasant, but none in a way that could generate any passion: they are mediocrities of vice- low scum. Their interior lives are flat and consequently their relationships are without richness. The challenges they are set are uninteresting, and it's impossible to give a hoot about whether they succeed or not.

Angel Heart: (1987): review: 9.5/10

In the fifties, a private detective, more used to low level investigations, is hired by a mysterious client to pursue a debter, believed to reside in a mental hospital.

In the process of this investigation we are taken to the deep south, specifically Lousiana, to explore its religious subcultures.

The film succeeds in combining elements of Southern Gothic with film noir and is beautifully shot, with exquisite scenography and use of colour. The acting is rivetting: the story is told with just the right balance of melancholy, wit, sensuality and horror.

Barfly (1987): review: 6/10

A dissolute writer engages in fist-fights and drinks heavily in the bars he frequents in LA. He meets a woman and moves in with her: they drink a lot and hang about bars.

The film begins very slowly but later picks up thanks to Faye Dunaway's charm.

It can be compared to "Factotum": both feature Charles Bukowski's alter ego, Henry Chinaski, and the plotlines are fairly similiar.

However, "Factotum" is more beautifully filmed, showing considerable sensitivity to urban locations and interiors. Moreover, the plot of "Factotum" is much more varied, and Dillon's acting is subtler: heis more convincing as a successful writer than Rourke.