manuel-pestalozzi This is a very unusual and probably much misunderstood movie which might have been handed over to the wrong guys for distribution. It has a lot of food for thought in store and is of high artistic quality. Let me enumerate what in my opinion makes Inserts worth ones time.1 the set. The whole movie plays on one set, like a theater play. It is the hall and living area of a big Hollywood mansion in the Depression era - the kind of environment Sunset Boulevard's Norma Desmond lives in. Its style is Spanish colonial (tiles, arches, pillars) but in the center there is a white, cylindrical staircase that looks like a later addition (or insertion?) and fits in badly. It creates a sort of a niche in the hall with a double bed, three spotlights and a camera on a tripod. This is the place of work of the Boy Wonder, a movie director of acknowledged genius who has fallen low and is producing (silent) porno movies. His is a one crew team, and the whole setup resembles more a painter's studio than a movie set. And there is no doubt that although the Boy Wonder has fallen low, he is determined to make art, he wants to be a Picasso with the movie camera, sort of.2 story development. The story is one long, uninterrupted real time sequence – again like a theater play. And it NEVER gets boring! People come and leave and return. A guy calls several times, a certain Clark Gable, a promising new star at Pathe, who would die to make a movie with the Boy Wonder. But each time he calls, the Boy Wonder tells someone else to turn him away and he never enters the frame. For me this movie has an unique way to shift the attention between characters with other characters remaining passively and unnoticed nearby in the same room for quite some time – that's what makes a movie a different experience from the theater. Thanks to this technique which works really well there isn't a main character but a dynamic and fluent exchange between bodies and souls, so to speak.3 the cast. It is very small and really good. Richard Dreyfuss looks rather like the exhausted Boy Wonder of 1972 than of 1927 with his frizzy head of hair, but then the character is in his private home, right? And people maybe did not oil it down even back then when they decided not to meet the general public for the day. Bob Hoskins is great as the slick ruthless producer with big plans. But who impressed me most was Jessica Harper. She plays a starlet in the making who would do anything to find success – in short a rather unpleasant person. She is at once strikingly beautiful and extremely annoying with her superior know-it-all attitude which badly conceals an almost complete ignorance. I think playing such a character, and playing it convincingly, is much more courageous than taking your clothes off (which she also does). To her and Dreyfus belongs the climax of the movie which is brought on by a colossal misunderstanding. This somehow tells us that everybody is performing but often for entirely different reasons which are ignored by the others. That this central message is conveyed by the means of sexual encounters seems to me not gratuitous at all but very fitting.4 the sounds. There is some fine vintage music of the period (Jessica Harper apparently was also musical adviser), the Boy Wonder plays some tune at the beginning and the end of the movie. For the rest of the time the sound of a distant power drill can be heard. At first I was not sure if it was an off screen sound, but then the Hoskins character makes it clear: they are building one of those – what's it called, fastways? – in the neighborhood, and the mansion will have to go soon. The distant hammering can be heard continually and it adds an oddly realistic touch which can be associated freely to all kinds of different things, a woodworm gnawing away not being the least.

ragreen259 After reading all of the reviews, I've come to the conclusion that people who enjoy movies, and apparently have a clue, enjoyed this movie for what it was. The people who talk smack about it, well, they all thought they were going to see some x-rated f*** flick, and were bummed that it didn't have any penetration or money shots in it. People ragged because it was X rated and say that was why it failed. I think it had more to do with the way it was distributed. Midnight Cowboy was originally X too, and it did quite well. Then there was Boogie Nights, which wasn't X rated, but dealt with the same subject on a broader scale--the porn industry. Did people go to see that, thinking that they were going to see a bunch of mainstream stars in a f*** flick? No.And look at who is in this movie--Dreyfus, Bob Hoskins, Veronica Cartwright and Jessica Harper! Geeze, how could anyone be thinking they were going to go see smut, then be disappointed because it turned out not to be... actually so disappointed, that 25 years later, all they can still remember about the movie is how disappointed they were when they went to see it when they were a kid that there was no money shot or semen-covered faces, that they blunder their way onto this site and give a lame review, because their libido was let down by art yet one more time. See this movie--but don't expect Deep Throat.

KGB-Greece-Patras I think many reviewers have lost the point here. This is no excuse for porn, you guys. If you want porn, go get porn. And if you are put off by a film that entirely takes place in an apartment, stay away. But I think that this film is not one you get to see every day. Its special 'plot' and context could only create a unique film. So, its rare... where do we find it? I saw it on MGM, late at night...This is a pretty sophisticated film on making porn. Dreyfuss is excellent as the alcoholic director. All in all, you are likely to love it if you like smart, dialog based films, and of course if you're not offended by some nudity and decadence. But what did you expect? This guys is making porn films in his apartment! Provocative , a bit offensive , surprisingly shockin, yes, but unique and original as well. Note: this is no expoitation flick, even though some might view enjoy it as such...

ubiquit2s I first saw this film alone. The following night I took my friends, and that weekend I named my band after it. In Cambridge in 1977, this film became a small cult. The allusions to silent days were intriguing to a burgeoning film buff, with Clark Gable, that kid from Pathe, forever trying to get through the door, junkie reminiscences of Wally Reid, and many more nods and in-jokes that I would undoubtedly smile at now from knowledge, not ignorance. The performances were, as I recall, uniformly good, with Dreyfus - whom I had only seen previously in American Graffiti - a revelation. This was also the first big screen role I can remember from Bob Hoskins, and after her small but memorable role in Love and Death, Jessica Harper brought just the right degree of irritating sexiness to Cathy Cake. Annoyingly, despite the limitations of scale, and the occasional staginess, I don't think John Byrum has ever made a better film!