326) The Fury (1978)

326) The Fury (1978) Dir: Brian De Palma Date Released: March 1978 Date Seen: October 5, 2009 Rating: 3.75/5

Perhaps there's no point in calling out Brian De Palma's The Fury (1978) for not making sense but I like to think there is. The film purposely inserts several gaps in its narrative but it does so for the sake of an abstract, insensible statement about how the children of the late '70s are being denied "the truth" and of robbed of their heritage but, thanks to some psychic powers, are taking their identities back. Right. You can see the righteous indignation that would lead De Palma to make a film as naked in its ire as Redacted (2007) in The Fury but its embedded so zealously in generic terms hand-picked from Carrie (1976) and Hitchockian road films like North by Northwest (1959) that it easily getslost in the shuffle. Much like the bulk of the film's fuzzier plot points.

I didn't even realize just how lost I was by The Fury until I skipped around in my DVD's scene selections in a vain search for some semblance of clarification. No such luck. I enjoy being led around by the nose by a talented filmmaker with a sense of humor as much as the next guy, maybe more so, but what's maddening here is that that level of mystery is in service to such a shallow and vague as hell, quasi-Zionist statement about the need for peace talks in the Middle East which Carter was spearheading. I don't get it but I did enjoy getting taken for a ride.

Note: One of the nagging, plot-based questions I had revolves around what I'm sure is only a gaffe--at one point, Gillian is called Ellen, a fact that even the DVD's subtitles will back me up on, je le jure. And yet, the fact that it was nevertheless kept in the film undermines the suggestion that any other scene in the film is intentionally left open-ended--just what the fuck does "I shot his arm. I killed it" mean? Well, it's not supposed to not make sense. It's Lynchian. Get with it, lame-o.