Remember My Name

This is a film made my Alan Rudoph and released in 1978. It stars Geraldine Chaplin and Anthony Perkins. Emily (Chaplin) is recently out of a twelve-year jail term for murder and she is pestering ex-husband Neil (Perkins), who has a hard-hat job and a good relationship with his current wife, Barbara, played by Berry Berenson, Perkin's real-life wife. It is of some interest to note that Berenson was Perkin's wife until he died of AIDS aged sixty in 1992. She died on American Airlines flight 11 in the attack on the World Trade Center on September 11th 2001, one day before the ninth anniversary of Perkin's death.

Remember My Name was the film Ruldolph made after Welcome to LA. The film was produced by Rudolph's long-time mentor, Robert Altman, and Altman's influence can be seen thoughout the film in its shooting and narrative methods. There are many slowly panning zoom shots following the narrative, and the narrative is not causally driven like many Hollywood films but slowly 'comes together' from a series of seemingly disparate scenes. There is a strong blues soundtrack that significantly adds to the pleasure in viewing the film.

The film is a strong outing for Chaplin, who had never impressed me until I saw recently Carlos Saura's Cria Cuervos. Here she is attractive, and plausibly malign and intelligent. She plays a chain-smoking and manipulative person intent on making contact with her ex-husband initially by hanging around his house and later by invading it. Perkins, as thin as a skeleton, also makes a strong contribution as a straight, working-class guy.

I was very pleased to see this film at the Cine Lumiere in London. The print was in fair condition, although the colour had very much deteriorated.