A film ahead of its time: I took another look at CECIL B. DEMENTED last night, a misunderstood film when it was released, still tragically neglected today. John Waters saw where movies were heading, and this futile rebellion is oddly heartbreaking in its portrayal of a gang of “cinema terrorists” who kidnap a movie star and force her to headline their radical agitprop manifesto. As they burn down a theater playing “Patch Adams (‘The Directors Cut’)” and disrupt a studio-shoot for “Forrest Gump, Part II,” their rallying cry (“Destroy Mainstream Cinema!”) could not be more resonant this summer. In its underground anger there has never been a more passionate cri de coeur of the cineaste (only Truffaut’s Day for Night compares). As we see everywhere the very real death of cinema, this film lifts the spirits.
