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-Wild Palms: The Dream Begins and the Dream Concludes-


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Wild Palms
-On Video-
Year Released: 1993
Type: Television Mini-Series
Category: Drama/Science Fiction
Rated: Not Rated
Running Time: 5 Hours
Studio: Capital Cities/ABC Video
Directors: Peter Hewitt (Hours 1 & 2), Kathryn Bigelow (Hour 3), Keith Gordon (Hours 4 & 5), Phil Joanou (Hour 6)
Cast:
JAMES BELUSHI as Harry Wyckoff
KIM CATTRALL as Paige Katz
DANA DELANY as Grace Wyckoff
ANGIE DICKINSON as Josie Ito
ROBERT LOGGIA as Senator Anton Kreutzer
ERNIE HUDSON as Tommy Lazlo
BEBE NEUWIRTH as Tabba Schwartzkopf
NICK MANCUSO as Tully Woiwode
CHARLES HALLAHAN as Gavin Whitehope
ROBERT MORSE as Chap Starfall
DAVID WARNER as Eli Levitt
BEN SAVAGE as Coty Wyckoff
BRAD DOURIF as Chickie Levitt
BOB GUNTON as Dr. Schenkl

Synopsis: Los Angeles in near future. Harry Wykoff accepts a job as president of a gigantic TV company. He is confronted with a completely new technology called "The New Reality" where three-dimensional TV pictures are projected in living rooms all around the world. Harry launches to the top of the company with his career but once there he is caught in a web of intrigue, betrayal, and murder. A game of life and death begins...


-Reviews-

By Colin Wheeler
From Oliver Stone and Bruce Wagner comes a brilliant, epic science fiction movie. Although very long this movie will keep you watching the whole way through. The plot is well put together and sustained. The story is topical and the actors well chosen. If you are looking for a movie that will keep you thinking for a long time after the tape has finished then this is the one.

[ Copyright© CW ]

By Kelly B. Faltermayer
The Wild Palms Mini Series first aired a few years ago, it was made for TV and it is based on the comic strip by the same name that appeared in Details Magazine in the early 90's. Its main audience was Generation X'ers, but I've heard that the comic strip became very popular with aging hippies, potheads, and the "underground" in general because of its offbeat pace and cerebral content. I taped it off the TV when it first aired and have watched it many, many times. I will definitely buy it on DVD when it comes out. The film stars Jim Belushi as Harry Wyckoff; Dana Delaney as Grace, his wife; Angie Dickinson as Josie, Grace's mother; Robert Loggia as Senator Tony Kreutzer, Josie's brother; and a few others like Kim Catrall, Bebe Newirth , and Ernie Hudson. Wild Palms is a story that takes place in the year 2065, and shows how technology has advanced to the point of being at the verge of making hollographic images physically interactive with human beings. Senator Kreutzer is about to launch a new sitcom on Channel 3 called Church Windows which will project the characters into people's living rooms. It will make people "feel" like part of the TV program. The dark side of the plan is that in order for people to interact with the hollograms, they have to take the drug MIMIZINE. Prolonged use of the drug has a side effect...it causes the user to see hallucinations of cathedrals and churches and it is ultimately fatal. But Senator Kreutzer wants the whole world to get hooked on hollographic TV for his own purposes, but you'll have to watch the film to find out what that is.

Wild Palms is the first major production concerning VIRTUAL REALITY, though there was a kind of predecessor in TRON and in other lesser known films. The concept of VR has been used in movies again and again since Wild Palms in varying degrees of benevolence and malevolence (e.i. THE LAWNMOWER MAN, VIRTUOSITY, THE MATRIX), but when Wild Palms first came out the idea of VR was pretty fresh and open to exploration. The premise of VR is that human beings can communicate, interact, copulate, and in essence live and die in VR which is an extension of the real world within a network of computers (like the internet).

The conflict in Wild Palms begins with Senator Kreutzer, he is the founder of a group called "The Fathers" who epitomize capitalism and right-wing, traditional politics (their corruption notwithstanding). Their antagonists are "The Friends" whose founder is a political prisoner named Eli Levitz. Eli used to be married to Josie...their daughter is Grace.

Chickie Levitz (played by Brad Douriff) has the secret to the GO CHIP, which is the thing that will allow Senator Kreutzer to achieve his final goal once everyone is hooked into the Church Windows Sitcom.

Throughout the film there's betrayal, seduction, incest, murder, and torture. None of it is overly graphic as it is not a "gore" film as such. The atmosphere of fear and impending doom is created more by what it implies than by what it shows. Like when Josie pokes the eyes out the artist. Not much is shown in the way of gore, but the scene is pretty disturbing.... Later in the film, as he prepares for revenge ,he says to Josie, "...once I was a painter, and mixing colors was my joy...", he then pokes her eyes out, and as she's screaming on the floor he shoots her a number of times.

The film is very textural and warbles in and out of psychological focus. It mixes Oriental mysticism, politics, philosophy, hi-tech drugs, and the American Dream in a mish-mash so weird, you just have to watch it to understand it. Many of the scenes are reminiscent of Peter Greenaway films (a.i. A Zed and Two Noughts, Drowning by Numbers, etc.)

[ Copyright© KBF, Courtesy of Amazon.com ]


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