Rita’s star turn as a Cover Girl
A Vietnam vet returns home to less than a hero’s welcome. It sounds like the start of The Deer Hunter but Quarry (18) ★★★★ has no time for the frontier romanticism of Michael Cimino’s masterpiece. The America we see in the nine-part series is a place of hopeless desperation – so desperate that a man haunted by what he’s seen in the field of battle heads straight back into it.
Set in the early Seventies, the man in question is Quarry (Logan Marshall-Green).
Disowned by his father, cuckolded by his wife and spat on by anti’Nam protesters, Quarry is an easy mark for The Broker (Peter Mullan). How would he like to earn an easy $30,000? All you gotta do is kill some people… Whether the characters are sturdy enough to carry the script’s
metaphysical weight is a moot point. What isn’t at issue are the excellent performances and the best soundtrack in years.
Talking of violence in the Seventies, Sam
Peckinpah’s Bring Me The Head Of Alfredo
Garcia (18) ★★★ finally makes it to the small screen. Was it worth the wait? As one who thinks Peckinpah was only at home on the range, I’d have to say not. But that’s not to deny the charm of Warren Oates’s Benny nor the emotive kick of his love affair with Elita (Isela Vega).
Kicks aplenty in Cover Girl (U) ★★★★ a Gene Kelly/Rita Hayworth hoofalong that will make you wonder what all the fuss over La La Land is about. Meanwhile, the 30thanniversary edition of Dirty
Dancing (12) ★★★★ is a lot of fun. OK, so Patrick Swayze wasn’t much of a singer, but this is still happy-making stuff.