Theo Angelopoulos: The Weeping Meadow

"You cannot step twice in the same river." - Heraclitus

Director/Writer - Theo Angelopoulos

Cinematographer - Andreas Sinanos

Cast Character
Alexandra Aidini .... Eleni
Nikos Poursanidis .... Mihalis
Giorgos Armenis .... Nikos
Vassilis Kolovos .... Spyros
Eva Kotomanidou ..... Kassandra

Theo Angelopoulos, Greece's most acclaimed director, shows the human soul through the environment and the zooms within long shots patient to reveal and are never forced. Like Terrence Malick he uses the environment sublimely to react to his characters and show their innermost character. He is concerned with the family and the identity they must adopt in order to come to a new land. His films are poetic in dialogue and in the way they unfold. They are epic like a Greek tragedy heavily entranced with the belief in fate. Watching one is a spectacle in sheer craftsmanship and cohesiveness.

The film opens opens with a narrator explaining these refugees coming from Odessa to Thessaloniki because the Red Army forced them out. It is a long take done in one shot to show the effort these people made from one land to another. Time and effort are what is represented in this shot. Likewise the language in the film is deliberate, meditative and poetic as seen in The Thin Red Line. These immigrants come in tattered and worn with just suitcases and clothes on their backs. Their reflections are shown in the water showing they will be watered down versions of their previous selves.

As the Bolshevik revolution spread everywhere Eleni returns to the village. Mihalis sees her again when they were separated. After he deflowers her, we get a close up of her white dress and curtains which hint at her perceived innocence with her crying after showing it is broken.

Eleni runs away from Spyros who took care of her at a young age. She was supposed to marry him but left at the last minute. The woman who takes care of Eleni compares her to the Holy Virgin - pure, innocent and without sin. Although the wedding is consummated she runs off knowing what has happened is sacrilegious. The shots in the film are slow and gradual - ones that build tension and dive deep into the feelings of the characters. We see their faces which are imprinted on the viewer like how Ingmar Bergman does especially seen in Cries and Whispers.

Mihalis takes Eleni from the river. When Spyros sees Eleni's torn dress on the water he falls to the ground in grief because he knows her innocence is gone. Musicians take in Eleni and Mihalis which is fitting due to their sad way of playing which is reflected throughout the film. Mihalis plays the accordion which offers the mood throughout their bleakness.


Nikos takes them to his theatre offering them a place to stay and salvation of sorts in order to hide them from Spyros. When Spyros comes he is a site to behold. He inhabits the room with dread and longing like nothing ever seen before. he calls out to Eleni in the theatre where both Eleni and Mihalis are hiding. He claims it is his wife but he shames himself by lusting after a woman so young. The backtracking shot of him in the abandoned, torn theatre with people watching him in the balconies is powerful. His longings for her are inappropriate but his sorrow is very real.

Nikos takes Mihalis to an abandoned building to which he hears music. The camera moves back making the room seem bigger - the world is opening up for him - his opportunities are expanding. He finds other musicians who can realize his dream.

As the story progresses Mihalis yearns for America. The love scene between Mihalis and Eleni is interesting because it is in total darkness showing their love as private and completely intimate. He reveals he sold his mother's ring to pay for her clothes - so she wouldn't wear rags anymore.

Trying to assemble an orchestra, Nikos offers a job to Mihalis but he fears being found by Spyros. The next scene opens with a landscape of white sheets drying outside symbolizing defeat of all of the musicians. Mihalis steps into frame to reiterate this feeling. It is also a sense of rebirth of new opportunity as he yearns to work and play music in America.

Mihalis gets his big break when Spyros tells him the famous Markos wants to hear him play. He tells Mihalis he hasn't heard such music in such a long time and the opportunity is his. The movie is focused on survival of Greece from the Red Army and the survival of its inhabitants particularly Mihalis and Eleni. Mihalis catches the opportunity of a lifetime when Spyros and Markos say he is invited to America to play for the Greeks there.

The sea is used as a transitional plane and a symbol of strength in Mihalis's opportunity. It is no surprise then that scene where many men dance with Eleni is by the sea as well. The film is unique in that the two protagonists, Eleni and Mihalis, don't age. We are introduced to their two twin sons who are about 10 each. They are introduced by the ocean where they want to play. They are hesitant near their parents but take comfort near the water. This is the foreshadowing and desire of both Eleni and Mihalis to make it abroad. They also wear sailor clothes to reemphasize this.

The musicians and citizens form a protest against their fascist government. They play songs in the beer hall as a celebration and refuge for one another. Spyros comes and asks to dance with Elenis to which she agrees and Mihalis obliges by playing the accordion without protest. The camera dollies back giving the old couple space for some bittersweet nostalgia. Eleni's black charade mask is her pain in the forefront. She steps back to reject him again. With great shock Spyros moves out of the room and dies.

Mihalis and Eleni come back to their home to find a their father' sheep all hung dead from a barren tree. This is a warning from the townspeople of how they will be treated from now on. Perhaps it has some meaning in Greek mythology. Soon people begin throwing rocks at their windows. The children in this film serve no other purpose beyond that of foils - to reveal the true nature of Mihalis and Eleni.

A flood comes and causes everyone to pack and leave. When they do leave they stand on the boat similar to the funeral procession that happened earlier on the boats. There is a good shot of a boy dressed in white on the porch alone while it is flooded outside. Three people dressed in black pass him by on a boat showing the death of hope. This is these people's lives for now on migrating from one place to another.

A great scene of a return to innocence for Eleni and Mihalis is when they fatefully walk to the white sheets again. They hear music and see one by one musicians playing - a sign that all is not lost. The musicians return to the sea and play for Mihalis and Eleni - a sign to go to America and become musicians.

When the couple reach the port and cannot board the boat for being late Eleni wants to give Mihalis a sweater. She apologizes for it not being finished so Mihalis pulls the string to make it come undone - his dreams are finished. He experiences humiliation in Ellis Island and plays for some small insignificant bands. He cannot believe he is so unlucky and that is is the real America.

As Eleni finds her dead son who was in the army she is now so lost with nobody left to love after everyone including Mihalis has died.

"Every blade of grass held little drops of dew that fell ever so often on the soft earth. This meadow is the source of the river."

Pain will turn to prosperity.

Michelangelo Antonioni: L'Avventura

Director/Writer - Michelangelo Antonioni

Cast Character

Gabriele Ferzetti - Sandro

Monica Vitti - Claudia

Lea Massari - Anna

Dominique Blanchar - Giulia

Renzo Ricci - Anna's Father

L'Avventura is a film about loss, alienation and the struggle to place meaning on things that do not necessarily need them. There is quiet solitude between the images and characters throughout the film. They understand and console eachother through the inevitable. The inevitability of their pain, shame and who they are and how they can never change. The film places heavy refection on the ocean and it's power - symbolic of the unconscious mind. The characters are also reflected in the wild ocean through their desires, fears and erratic tendencies.

At the start of the film we are introduced to Anna a sullen woman made even more-so by her father's reminding that her boyfriend, Sandro, will never marry her. He is a playboy and unapologetic at that. Her father represents strength and dignity as he is a politician. The film doesn't show his dealings or his character as he is briefly in the film but by later in the film we can infer he is dignified of sorts.

Claudia lets Sandro take her in the hotel primarily to make her friend Ana jealous. The fast river current under the balcony shows the torrid feelings she has for Anna. As they make there way to the boat trip they head to Aeolian Islands. On the boat Lady Patrizia a self made aristocrat of sorts says, "Islands I don't get them ... surrounded by nothing but water...poor things..." This shows her and the rest of the groups spiritual isolation. They are unreachable, incommunicable even with each other. They talk tritely with one another through fixed lines and prepackaged emotions.

In a funny scene with Raimondo and Patrizia he gropes her after she lights a cigarette. She lights a cigarette before and not after showing her boredom and dissatisfaction with life in having everything. Sandro comments she is faithful not out of obligation but rather laziness. When you have a yacht, money and everything you want nothing can satisfy.

The location they go to, Aeolian island, of all places is cold, rough and uninviting much like the characters. Anna on the island asks Sandro why he hasn't married her. The rocky uninviting island and the choppy water symbolize their uneasy relationship. She wants commitment, he wants freedom.

Soon Anna inexplicably disappears. Claudia looks for Anna. Sandro says it is her typical behavior that drives him mad. Sandro's clothes blend with the rock showing he is part of the background for Anna. Her disappearance is metaphysical, a suicide of the soul, denoting her her unhappiness. She chooses to vanish through her endless frustration.

Claudia looks at two twigs together one intact, one broken, like their ambiguous relationship. Claudia is fine, Anna is damaged. From the scene where they are changing bathing suits one can guess they are lesbians. They take their time when changing clothes not shy to look at each other.

They meet a man who visits the house on the island from Panarea. They question thoroughly thinking he could have kidnapped or taken her but he is bewildered by this. Finally he suggest she might have fallen off the cliff because he had a lamb that did. Ana is like a sacrificial lamb making up for the group's lack of spirituality and emptiness. But more so Ana dies through metaphysical suicide because of her hollowness. Her soul and spirit are dead so her body soon follows. She also avenges Sandro for his lack of seriousness in her.



The story then focuses on Claudia. The tension between she and Sandro starts from concern of Anna then moves to Sandro's attraction to her. This happens rather quickly for him funnily. He replaces one void for another. As Claudia breaks down and cries Patrizia doesn't do anything but just watches her. Many of the conversations and characters' actions throughout the film show the peoples' superficiality and dis-ingenuousness. The best one is when Sandro explains he loathes scuba diving but must conform. Claudia escapes all of Sandro's advances which come at some of the most inappropriate of times including on the island shortly after Anna goes missing. He is shameless and somewhat heroic.

Anna's father arrives by boat and is relieved Anna had a Bible making him believe she didn't commit suicide. As Sandro boards the boat to see Claudia he finally makes a move and kisses her to which she is fearful and tries to escape. The camera angle of the boat rocks left and right showing her dizzy, ambiguous feelings.



Claudia tries to leave by train. Sandro wants to go but she suggests he find Anna because it would complicate things further. She leaves to Milazzo but Sandro chases the train and hops on. He pushes further reminding her to forget Anna but Claudia's guilt is strong. As she sees a guy in the next compartment flirting with a girl it reminds her of Sandro's positive qualities and lightens the mood. As Claudia snaps of her trance she begs Sandro to not look for her. She most likely fears what happened to Anna will happen to her. He reluctantly leaves.

The next scene is filmed in a cinema-verite style reminiscent of the film Battle of Algiers. A funny scene has a loacl celebrity, Gloria Perkins, who is 19 goes to a notions shop to fix her dress which is ripped. Hundreds of men gather in their depravity hoping to see her. She gladly shows off her torn dress to everyone.

Sandro meets Zuria, a newspaper writer who wrote an article on Anna's disappearance. Sandro hopes to get some information on her. He tells hm there are rumors of her spottings in Rome and other cities but nothing is confirmed. He hints she may have sailed away in secret. When Sandro returns to his group they make jokes of her disappearance and carry on like nothing.


Giulia introduces Claudia to Goffredo, the princess's gradson who is 17. He is a stereotypical painter and does only nudes. He gives Giulia some cheesy dialogue to try and seduce her, she plays along. Claudia is the only person in the film concerned about Anna. The rest act their parts to give fake sympathy. Goffredo seduces Giulia in front of Claudia to which Giulia demands she leave.

Sandro continues his search of Anna. The next scene is pretty funny between the dispute between the pharmacist and his wife who argue over the attractive woman who came in. The husband and wife give different descriptions which are useless to Sandro at this point. When the paracist and Sandro are alone he tells him she went to Noto.

Sandro and Claudia go to a church and Claudia calls in:

Clauida: "Hear the echo... Why is it empty?"

Sandro: "Who knows. I wonder why they built it at all."

This is Antonioni's way of showing his characters as empty and searching to fill that void. Sandro has accepted his hollowness and chooses to move on quite fast as we see after Anna goes missing. He wonders why faith is offered when having it offers nothing in return. Claudia is more conflicted. It is as if Claudia is asking God what to do to which he is silent - giving her permission to further the affair.

The next scene has Sandro and Claudia kissing happily - no guilt for the first time. In a funny scene with Claudia around a hundred men followand stare at her once Sandro is away. This is her guilt crawling up again. The men are her subconscious. The men may also reprensent Anna's scorn.

He takes her to a square with magnificant buildings. He explains his profession as an architect and like an architect must convince her their foundation is strong and ready to be built upon. He explains he must do much estimating and cost evaluations - hinting he fools around and that is all part of the game. She is weary. A nun takes them to the top of the roof to show them the roof.

He asks her to get married. She says no. Eventually after much persuading she says yes. The next scene has her dancing and singing in her apartment like a kid again. When he is sullen - she knows he is thinking of Anna and she gets needy again. Her love is primarily based on narcissism and attention. His on power and ego.

One good scene is when inside the hotel Sandro looks out his window. The camera pans around to his view of the church. He closes the window - closig his eyes on ethics - to try to have sex with Claudia without remorse or guilt. She repulses knowing about Anna. They continue looking for her. As they go to a party she meets a friend who she tries to avoid. When they sit down a man above is seen with a rosary in his hand making her uncomfortable as Sandro was uncomfortable with the window open.

The next hotel they feel comfortable as there is heavy curtains up. This obviously shows their guilt for what they are doing. He meets Gloria Perkins at the party.

When Claudia confides in Patrizia about Anna she gives her trite advice. Everyone in the film is hollow and uncaringof one another except Claudia and even she is no saint. She is the only one who keeps searching emotionally and spiritually.

When she finds Sandro with Gloria Perkins she breaks down. When he returns to her he has nothing but visible shame. It is enough remorse for her for forgiveness.

Wong Kar Wai: Chungking Express

Chungking Express

Director/Writer – Kar Wai Wong

Cast Character

Brigitte Lin Woman in blonde wig

Tony Leung Chiew Wai Cop 663

Faye Wong Faye

Takeshi Kaneshiro He Zhiwu, Cop 223

Valerie Chow Air Hostess

Chen Jinguan Manager of Midnight Express

Chungking Express is not so much a movie about characters and plot, but rather moods and atmosphere. Wong Kar Wai is a master of subtlety navigating your senses through calm transitions of color and camera angles to give you a canvas of raw energy and emotion no other director could touch. His film is more of an impressionistic painting seduced by the music not unlike Godard’s Breathless. He brings you to his charming characters that are arrested in not their limitations but the immobilizing possibility of “what if.” No other film shows this dilemma more masterfully than In the Mood for Love and Chungking Express.

Chungking Express is about two lovelorn cops trying to forget past women without sabotaging new ones that come into their lives. Each cop meets a woman who is fascinating in their own way but preoccupied by their own worlds and whims. They seek the ethereal, the men seek the tangible and real. This creates a believable and engaging chemistry between the actors that is nothing short of hypnotic. All things come to an end and everything has an expiration date even a can of pineapple. Cop 223, He Zhiwu, buys a can of pineapple each month with an expiration of May 1. He waits for the time he will be rejoined with his lost love and repeats this agonizing torture.

Wong Kar Wai uses stop motion photography in his film to add a sense of danger and tension of the unknown and chaos of these people’s lives and their fractured hearts. The film starts with He Zhiwu, Cop 223, calling several women from his past hoping to get a date. It is both hilarious and embarrassing to feel his frustration. He is optimistic and unrelenting despite his failures. He is lovable but very sad. The colors in Wong Kar Wai’s films are so rich and saturated you feel as if they dictate the mood throughout. The same is true for his film Ashes of Time Redux which is equally stunning.

The film is constructed into two parts. One centering on He Zhiwu and his pursuit after the mysterious women in a blonde wig and the second on the distant romance of Cop 663 and Faye. The first two are distant and tense. The second pair is playful but timid.

What is interesting about both couples is that they seem to be the same people. The two men are given police numbers and the two women’s names and Faye and May. Both sets of people may be symbolically the same representing their past and present selves. Their past selves are more tense and frantic their present selves played by Tony Leung and Faye Wong are more accepting of their situation and are playful about it.

Cop 223 vows to buy 30 cans of pineapple for 30 months as due dates for May’s love. She loved pineapple hence the idea. One of the funniest scenes in the film is when after a failed drug smuggling the blonde mysterious woman kidnaps an Indian’s daughter threatening to kill her then takes her to ice cream while the conspirator waits. Chance meetings and interactions detail the film. Just like when Cop 223 bumps into the mysterious blonde, we see Faye exiting a shop buying a bear as the mysterious blonde waits outside.

It is interesting why Wong Kar Wai put a fish tank in the film. Maybe it symbolizes Cop 223 waiting for his ex girlfriend’s love like the fish waiting for the crumbs. The voiceover’s and musings are funny throughout.

Cop 223: We're all unlucky in love sometimes. When I am, I go jogging. The body loses water when you jog, so you have none left for tears.

His birthday is on May 1 and runs to rid himself of tears. It is no coincidence his birthday and love is May. It is little nuances like this that make the movie so enjoyable.

The way the foreigner puts a blonde wig on his worker’s head is like that of the mysterious blonde. Later we see the mysterious blonde kill him and drop the wig transferring herself to the new woman giving up on the potentially ambiguous relationship between the foreigner and her. Most likely he was involved with the drug smuggling where the Indians stole the dope. As he dies there is a funny shot of a can with an expiration date – all things must come to an end.

As the new chapter of the story begins we get Cop 223, played by Tony Leung, who order a chef salad. He and Faye give one of the best conversations in the movie:

Cop 663: You like noisy music?

Faye: The louder the better. Stops me from thinking.

Cop 663: You don't like to think? What do you like?

Faye: Never thought about it.

Cop 663 orders fish and chips and salad for his girlfriend symbolizing options and that he can change for her. But like the rejected food people know what they like and usually never change. When she does try to contact him she goes to Midnight Express to drop off a letter for him. Faye studies her intently to see Cop 663’s type. A hilarious scene follows of everyone in the whole restaurant taking turns reading the letter. She leaves the keys to his apartment in the letter, which will be Faye’s advantage throughout the film.

The fractured stop motion camera shots show Faye and Cop 663 stuck in time. He is lost in his thoughts; she is becoming lost in him. In his apartment he loses himself in his wallows. He talks to his possessions to ease his pain.

Cop 663: Since she left, everything in the flat is sad. Everything needed lulling to sleep.
[to a bar of soap]

Cop 663: You've lost a lot of weight, you know. You used to be so chubby. Have more confidence in yourself.
[to a threadbare wet dishcloth]

Cop663: You have to stop crying, you know. Where's your strength and absorbency? You're so shabby these days.

After telling him she has his letter, she asks for his address to send it to him. Faye yearns for him from afar but puts on her carefree self. What entails is a series of break-ins where she redecorates his apartment. Replacing old things with new symbolizing her want for him to move on emotionally from his ex girlfriend.

When he tries to call out his ex’s name to get out of the closet hoping in his mind she will return. Instead we get the mischievous Faye who actually is in the closet who hides throughout the apartment. When he leaves she calls out to him the same way his air hostess ex girlfriend did leading one to believe they are in fact cosmically the same person. She also plays with the toy airplane the same way his ex did. She goes on to clean his apartment and look at his bed with a magnifying glass to look for women’s hairs. As he tells her earlier that he drinks coffee because he cannot sleep, she breaks into his apartment again and puts sleeping pills in his water. She replaces the old white stuffed animal with a big orange one of Garfield. Again she is trying to subtly put herself in his life and in his subconscious. Before leaving she erases his outgoing answering machine message with his ex girlfriend’s voice.

When she is finally caught in his apartment she gets a cramp and cannot leave. Another funny similarity between Cop 663’s ex girlfriend and Faye are they loved the same song “California Dreamin.” All the similarities between these two women show they are in fact the same person.

Spoilers

When he does finally visit her at the restaurant to ask her out. She is scared after being caught in his apartment. He tells her to meet him at California Restaurant. She seems excited after he leaves but sabotages herself for fear of possible failure. When he goes and waits for her the owner of Midnight Express brings him a note saying she couldn’t make it. This is the same way he was let go by the Air Hostess. Faye becomes an Air Hostess leaves for one year to return later to Hong Kong. Faye tries to become his ex so he desires her more. When she returns the fire is still alive.

Martin Scorsese: After Hours

After Hours

Director – Martin Scorsese
Writer – Joseph Minion
Cinematographer – Michael Ballhaus

Actor Character
Griffin Dunne Paul Hacket
Rosanna Arquette Marcy Franklin
Verna Bloom June
Tommy Chong Pepe
Linda Fiorentino Kiki
Cheech Marin Neil

After Hours is a comedy that goes 100 miles per hour about a poor shlup on the worst night of his life. Paul Hackett is a typist who lives his life in complete cyclic boredom. He is emotionally comatose and without any sense enthusiasm for anything. His luck, so he thinks changes when one sleepless night he goes to a diner to read a book. He meets an interesting blonde. Scorsese is particularly fond of blondes in is films not unlike Alfred Hitchcock. She begins commenting on the book he is reading and as things progress he agrees to buy her friend’s paperweight at her apartment hoping to get lucky. Paul reads “Tropic of Cancer” in a restaurant that uses a dolly shot that reminds one of the scene in Taxi Driver where Travis Bickle and Betsy are talking in her campaign headquarters. It expresses movement, opportunity and disorder. Scorsese’s movies are frantic with camera angles in order to show the inner turmoil of his characters.

His character Paul played by Griffin Dunne is just a normal guy trying to be happy and trying to get laid. Not demanding goals in life. Everyone around him is a nutcase to which he tries to glide through unaffected. When Marcy, the girl from the coffee shop, invites him to her place the expression on his face is priceless. He looks like he is going to faint from joy. There is an interesting shot on him on the telephone with Marcy. The close-up goes from his mouth to his ear then to his eye. It starts as uncertainty to joy then hesitation again.

Things quickly descend from bad to shit as Paul loses his 20-dollar bill that flies out the taxi window. The scene is shot in a hyper kinetic fashion similar to the scenes with ambulance in Bringing Out the Dead.
He meets Kiki, a plaster sculptress, and in one of the best lines of the movie:

Paul: Is Marcy here?
Kiki: She has to go to the all night drugstore.
Paul: Is she alright?
Kiki: It’s under control.

To further Griffin Dunne’s realistic portrayal of anxiety and paranoia in the film Martin Scorsese told him to not have sex or sleep during the filming of the movie. Every scene he seems agitated and on edge because of this. In the film Paul is a shy horndog trying to get lucky with whomever. As he gives Kiki a massage he tells her a story to which she falls asleep. When Marcy comes in she sees her asleep on the couch with only a bra on with Paul beside her. The tension is so thick in this scene. When he goes to Marcy’s room he sits on the bed while she is in the shower and we see two people having sex in the background out of focus in the next building. It shows what’s constantly on his mind and his frustration. He tries to seduce her but quickly goes into the dry crotch “friend zone.” Instant death.
Marcy tells him a story about being raped:

Marcy: I was raped once. As a matter of fact it happened right here in this very room. I lived here once. He came in through there on the fire escape. He held a knife to my throat and said if I made a move, he'd cut my tongue out. He tied me to the bed... he took his time... six hours.
Paul: My god... Was he, uh... did they get this guy?
Marcy: No. Actually it was a boyfriend of mine. To tell you the truth, I slept through most of it. So... there you are.

He escapes the apartment and her weirdness and as the weirdness ensues a low angle Dutch-tilts show Paul’s impending doom. As he tries to buy a subway ticket he again is down on his luck as the fare went up that night leaving him stranded:

Paul: Couldn't you just give me one token, please?
Subway Attendant: I can't do that. I may lose my job. 
[Paul looks around and sees no one else in the station]
Paul: Well, who would know... exactly?
Subway Attendant: I could go to a party, get drunk, talk to someone... who knows?

Spoilers

As he goes to Terminal Bar the bartender agrees to give him subway fare in exchange for a ticket. They exchange keys as a deposit of trust. He goes to his apartment and is accused of being a burglar. After this he goes to Kiki’s apartment he finds Marcy dead overdosed on pills. He goes back to the Terminal Bar finds a woman there who looks as if she stepped out of the 1950s who seems interested in Paul. His luck looks as if it begins to change but everything this guy touches turns to shit. She turns out to be psychotic emotional mess after he makes a joke trying to lighten the mood. He gets her to shut up and stop crying after agreeing he will see her again. She then gives him a bagel paperweight as a reward to returning to him.

He meets Gale who is another nutcase who offers to drive him home in her ice cream truck of all vehicles. Once she sees a sign of Paul as a falsely accused burglar she blows a whistle to the mob and they chase after him. Once atop a stairwell he witnesses a woman murdering her husband and wisely says, “I’ll probably get blamed for that.”

Just as he finds his bartender friend and explains the craziness that has happened, the bartender tells him he will get his keys. He then tells Julie and the angry mob he is in the diner.
He hides in an alternative goth club and tries to seduce the only woman there. He needs anything or anyone to calm his nerves. She helps him hide by putting him in a plaster statue while the mob looks in the bar and her workspace. After everyone leaves Cheech and Chong enter in and steal the plaster statue that Cheech is fond of. Saying:

Pepe: Art sure is ugly.
Neil: Shows how much you know about art. The uglier the art, the more it’s worth.
Pepe: This must be a fortune, man.
They load him in the van and drive across New York having him fall out on the street in front of his job. He brushes himself off as if nothing happened.

What’s so great about this film is how Scorsese can work wonders on a small budget. They use every zany opportunity to torture this poor guy which flows from one situation to the next seamlessly. The camera is always moving adding tension and paranoia throughout the film.