Before he embraced Hitchcockian thrillers, Brian De Palma was a social satirist with an experimental flair and a counterculture take who worked with Robert De Niro in three films. The Wedding Party (1969), a broad social satire of a working-class groom on the estate of a society bride was made in collaboration with filmmakers Wilford Leach and Cynthia Munroe, and it features broadly exaggerated characters, class commentary, and bad behavior all around. De Niro has a small role and Jill Clayburgh costars as the bride. Greetings (1968) gets more political in its episodic story of three buddies—two men (Jonathan Warden and De Niro) trying to avoid the draft and a Kennedy conspiracy theorist (Gerrit Graham)—in chapters that play like offbeat skits, and it takes a bizarre turn when De Niro's character becomes an amateur porno filmmaker (Greetings was the first film to receive an "X" rating, for nudity and language). Hi, Mom! (1970) is a loose sequel that features De Niro's character after his tour of duty in Vietnam as he continues his interest in voyeuristic "peep art" porn films and gets involved in a radical theater group. The "Be Black, Baby" sequence—an immersive, interactive theater experience that puts the white, middle-class audience through a degrading ordeal—is still one of the most radical works of social satire and race commentary in American cinema. These are overlooked independent works with social commentary and satirical wit, fascinating examples of 1960s radical cinema from a director who isn't considered a radical filmmaker. Extras include audio commentary by film critic Glenn Kenny on Greetings, and interviews with producer Charles Hirsch and film critic Howard S. Berger. A strong optional purchase. (S. Axmaker)
De Niro & De Palma: The Early Years
Arrow, 3 discs, 267 min., not rated, Blu-ray: $69.95 Volume 34, Issue 2
De Niro & De Palma: The Early Years
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