
Boxing Helena is the oft-maligned and misunderstood debut of Jennifer Chambers Lynch, daughter of course, of the great David Lynch. But, let's face it, not all of that maligning is based on misunderstanding; some of the criticism is fair. Boxing Helena is a crazily overwrought melodrama, which is clearly intentionally over-the-top and unreal. Writer/director Lynch consistently refers to it as a fairy tale, so anybody expecting a realistic, down to earth drama just needs their expectations adjusted. But even for a fairy tale, it's a bit dopey.
Julian Sands plays a goofy surgeon with huge, on-the-nose oedipal issues and a truly blind, unrequited love for Sherilyn Fenn, who plays her character to such a selfish, nasty degree that they clearly meant her to be some sort of hypothetical archetype rather than a relatable character. Anyway, she doesn't like him back - she's currently involved with Bill Paxton, but seems to resent him almost as much - and continues to push Sands away. So when she's hit by a car outside his house, he leaps at the gruesome opportunity to amputate her legs and keep her completely dependent on him in his house. And yes, at some point he also cuts off her arms and puts her in an ornate box.
It explores the possessive, demanding side of love relationships to comically exaggerated degrees - we see plenty of the Venus De Milo in Sands' opulent home - but not without real substance or compelling things to say about them. It's probably the film's rejection of the more conventional Hollywood entertainment style, specifically that it persistently refuses to allow the audience to empathize or side with any of the characters that turns most people off. We're exploring the bad sides of our characters here; and while I think you could say it has a naturally feminist perspective, it certainly doesn't deliver the expected, pat feminist message either. It wants to be both challenging art and a trashy erotic romp at the same time, and that's not the kind of thing most people will receive well. But there's definitely a lot to appreciate in this movie if you're of the right mind-set.
Plus, hey, almost everybody judging this film is basing it on the DVD, catching it on cable, the old VHS or whatever. Unless you've seen the limited edition laserdisc, you've never even seen the director's cut "including footage not seen in the theatrical or home video versions," as it says on the back of the box. It's not fair to judge the film based on a version the director doesn't endorse, right, when you haven't even seen the whole thing? So, just what is different about the two versions?
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"Hasta la whatever" is actually Paxton's exit line in this scene - how can you not love that? |
There is exactly one change differentiating the director's cut. Sands' very last line of the film (which I won't spoil here, of course), that plays in voice over at the very, very end... does not play in the director's cut. She didn't want it to be in the film, so the music plays out into the credits and it's all exactly as you see it on the DVD, video tape, etc... but you don't hear that line. That "footage not seen" claim only applies because the old VHS release was the edited R-rated cut.
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Orion laserdisc on top; MGM DVD middle; and a combination of the two bottom. |
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Orion laserdisc on top; MGM DVD below. |
...The image is also fuzzier, lacking detail and over-saturated, but part of that can be blamed on the imperfect nature of capturing an analog image from a laserdisc onto a computer to screencap it. So give the laserdisc maybe a 10-15% benefit of the doubt when judging the image quality based on these frames. But yeah, the DVD looks yards better.
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I'm sorry; I just don't buy that those are her curtains. |
The usual collection of non-video extras that laserdiscs often have, which I don't think work so well or add much value, are also on hand. There's the complete screenplay, production stills, the shooting schedule. That kind of stuff. But then there's plenty of good video extras, starting with an on-camera interview with Lynch and Mazzocone, this time being interviewed by a moderator, that pretty much fills in the blanks of anything they didn't cover in the commentary. It goes on pretty long, taking up almost the entire side of one disc.
Then there's a short, but very fun featurette with the guy who built and designed Helena's titular box - he makes similar boxes for magicians and illusionists, so he refuses to tell us all its secrets, but it's still a cool little piece. Then there's a comparison of alternate scenes between the R-rated and unrated cuts, where we see full versions of both, with optional audio commentary by Mazzocone, where he takes the opportunity to talk about Madonna and Kim Bassinger, who both agreed to star in the film and later backed out, rather then the footage on screen, but it's still quite interesting. They also include the alternate ending with that last line of dialogue put back into the final scene. It's a pretty thorough set. Curiously, the one absent extra in this set is the theatrical trailer. And it's the only other thing on the DVD.
And you can't argue with the packaging. The set comes in a cool, black box with a note from Lynch and full color photos on the insert. An entire second laserdisc is devoted entirely to the extras. And there's also a bonus 19-track soundtrack CD, which includes both the score and pop songs - a 24K gold CD, no less! And remember, that one techno/ choir song by Enigma got more famous than any other aspect of the movie, so the soundtrack was a big feature.
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