Thursday, August 21, 2014

Maidstone (1970)


New Line Cinema
Directed by Norman Mailer
My rating: 1.5 stars out of 4
IMDb
(DVD, Criterion Eclipse)

Mailer basically plays himself this time around, a writer turned director of a movie set in a whorehouse. He casts all of the women in the film personally of course, which provides him with plenty of opportunities to display his rampant misogyny. Once the film starts shooting, it's hardly more than a homemade movie of beautiful girls taking off their clothes and making out with whomever is standing nearby, and Mailer is sure he is always around. There is also some nonsense about his presidential campaign, where once again Mailer is the center of attention. One of the actors, Rip Torn, decides to hit Mailer over the head with a hammer and wrestle on some grass, which draws real blood from both of them. I'm just glad someone had the courage to stand up to him.

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