Slaughterhouse Five DVD ... Where do you start with a description of the Slaughterhouse Five DVD - Billy Pilgrim, a strange young man, and an Old man who has come to accept that which he can't change with quiet dignity, occupying the same space and time, as if time were bunched together like a ball of string. Billy Flits between different time segments of his own existence, from shortly after Birth, to the very end of existence its-self. Being thrown back to the Era of World War 2 in the freezing Snowfields of the German occupation, whilst in the middle of a Barbeque with family and friends, in the warm spring days of North east USA. Disorientation is a thing of the past for Pilgrim, who has suffered this transport too many times to count. Slaughterhouse Five Now on DVD Goes on to follow Billy Pilgrim through his capture by German troops, and subsequent humiliations in the POW Camp, where he discovers a precious Diamond hidden in the clothing that was supplied by the Germans. As Billy progresses through time as we see it, He does age, and comes under the scrutiny of the Tralfamadorian People, who have taken an interest in him, and have plenty of expectations of Billy themselves. The Slaughterhouse Five DVD is a Must Have Collectible, as is any of Vonneguts masterpiece tales. Travel along with Billy on a journey that opens your mind to possibilities we don't usually consider. Trying to capture a Kurt Vonnegut Story on Film Whether its the strange tale of Billy Pilgrim on The Slaughterhouse Five DVD or the almost Impossible to fathom Scenario of Dwayne Hoover in the Totally Bizarre Insane world of Breakfast of Champions, must be the biggest headache for a Director and producer of a film on this Level. Kurt vonnegut has the Strangest tales to Tell, in The Strangest Way of telling them, and the Slaughterhouse Five DVD Will get that message across, almost as Much as the Breakfast of Champions DVD will...
Time Tripping... No one will believe Billy Pilgrim (Michael Sacks) when he says he has come "unstuck in time," reliving in aimless order all the events in his life. Living in seclusion in llium, New York, the timid widower is typing out a letter to the local paper about his time treks when suddenly, he is trapped behind German lines in wintry World War II Belgium. Next he is in his wedding bed with his wealthy weighty bride Valencia (Sharon Gans). Interspersed with his leapfrog adventures in time, Billy also finds himself being transported to and from the distant planet Tralfamadore, whose invisible inhabitants enclose him in a glass dome furnished with Sears Roebuck furniture and a kittenish Hollywood starlet (Valerie Perrine), to whom Billy is expected to make love. This big-budget production of Kurt Vonnegut's best-selling, semi-autographical novel, was shot in Czechoslovakia, Minnesota, and the Universial Studios sound stages, under a shroud of secrecy, with no publicist and little information provided to the press. The devout "Vonnegut cult" of college students feared that the complex, highly-stylizwd 1969 novel would defy screen adaptation. Critics differed on the bizarre, dreamlike film, but none could argue with the movie's message that the world is a collection of moments, "and if we're going to survive, it's up to us to concentrate on the good moments and ignore the bad." | Time Travel's a Bitch... " Billy Pilgrim (Michael Sacks) has a problem with time: he keeps jumping about in his own life, principally between three key scenes. The "present" is a kind of glowing suburban bliss involving a dutiful wife, large house, and presidency of the local Lions; the "past" is being a prisoner of World War II and experiencing the firebombing of Dresden from the wrong side; the "future" takes place in a glass dome on the planet Tralfamadore, to which Billy has been mysteriously spirited along with the woman of his fantasies (Montana Wildhack, played by Valerie Perrine). It isn't meant to make too much sense, since the point is to represent a man (and a century) that has witnessed things too unbearable for a wholly sane person to make sense of. In fact author Kurt Vonnegut's anguished cry on the insanity of war is one of those completely unfilmable books, so director George Roy Hill gets points even for trying. The whole package is thought provoking in a wholly Vonnegutian way. All this, and Glenn Gould playing Bach as well." --Richard Farr |
Breakfast of Champions - Required Reading through School...
Kurt Vonnegut had a style all his own, not so easy to keep up with, but the little doodles at the edge of some pages often help, Many of his stories will be historic documents one day, and the depth of his tales will be discussed endlessly for centuries. Slaughterhouse Five is a compelling story, certainly, but what were they thinking when they thought they could put Breakfast of Champions to Film. This must be the single Hardest story to consider filming. The depiction of a Salesman Gone mad, and the first person perspective of the story through his insane eyes, would have been a daunting task to produce. The Book of Breakfast of Champions was a struggle to read, due to the complexity of the story, and characters, and it left you with a profound fear of mirrors, as you never knew if you might fall through a "Leak"...
Director Alan Rudolph's adaptation of Kurt Vonnegut's novel Breakfast of Champions centers on suicidal car dealer Dwayne Hoover (Bruce Willis), his drug- and television-addled wife Celia (Barbara Hershey), his cross-dressing sales manager Harry (Nick Nolte), his dim secretary and mistress Francine (Glenne Headly), and Vonnegut's alter ego of sorts, pulp writer Kilgore Trout (Albert Finney). Dwayne is desperate for meaning in his life and starts to believe that Trout, who has been invited to the town's impending arts festival, will be able to tell him some truth he's never heard before. The EPA is investigating toxic sludge under property Dwayne owns, Celia is losing her already fragile grip on reality, Harry is growing increasingly paranoid that Dwayne knows about his private habits, and Francine is impatient with Dwayne's increasingly erratic behavior. Meanwhile, Kilgore Trout grouses about his failures and finally decides to attend the arts festival as a final act of self-humiliation. On top of all this, there are four or five other characters, all eccentric to the point of overload. It's difficult to get a fix on what the movie wants to be about, but Glenne Headly makes her character an island of sympathy in the ocean of everyone else's self-absorption, and Albert Finney creates some poignant moments as Trout is confronted by people who either scorn or worship his stories without any attempt to understand them. Featuring a cameo by Vonnegut. --Bret Fetzer
