GLEN AND RANDA

   Film (1971). UMC. Dir Jim McBride, starring Steven Curry, Shelley Plimpton, Woodrow Chambliss, Garry Goodrow. Screenplay Lorenzo Mans, Rudolf WURLITZER, McBride. 94 mins. Colour.

   The film opens with a shot of a naked man and woman walking hand-in-hand through a dreamlike setting, but it soon becomes clear that this is not the Garden of Eden but a post- HOLOCAUST USA. The young couple drift through the shattered debris ofcivilization in a search for the mythical city of Metropolis, encountering other survivors along the way; Randa (Plimpton) dies in childbirth, but Glen (Curry) continues his quest. Though made independently for verylittle money (shot on 16mm and later blown up to 35mm), GAR is more interesting than most of its kind due to McBride's ingenuity in creating an evocatively desolate and sometimes beautiful setting out of existing landscapes; the film is austere but hopeful. McBride has not done much commercial work, but he did go on to make the excellent thriller The Big Easy (1986).

   JB/PN