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Short Cuts (1993)
In Robert Altman's naked depiction of desperate people
in Southern California:
- the exhilarating opening credits scene with images
of noisy helicopters dumping insecticide onto Los Angeles neighborhoods
to kill medflys - and in the film's conclusion, another disaster
- an earthquake
- the film's fluid interweaving and overlapping of
the tragi-comic stories/lives of 22 characters in about ten separate
episodic story-lines, including:
- classical cello-playing musician Zoe Trainer (Lori Singer), the pretty
blonde daughter of alcoholic cabaret jazz singer Tess Trainer (Annie
Ross), both next-door neighbors to the Finnigans; Zoe committed suicide
by carbon monoxide asphyxiation in her garage
- three fishing buddies on a three-day fishing trip: out of work salesman
Stuart Kane (Fred Ward) - who was married to clown-performer Claire
Kane (Anne Archer) who entertained at childrens' parties, Gordon Johnson
(Buck Henry), and Vern Miller (Huey Lewis); they stopped off at Doreen's
restaurant for breakfast before leaving on their trip; they found a
dead 23 year-old raped girl's body floating lifeless near their campsite
and decided to postpone reporting the murder
- hit-and-run waitress Doreen Piggot (Lily Tomlin) who was married
to abusive drunk limousine driver Earl Piggot (Tom Waits), who hung
out in the nightclub where Tess Trainer performed
- mother Lois Kaiser (Jennifer Jason Leigh) who engaged in phone sex
while diapering and feeding her baby, and was married to swimming pool
cleaner Jerry Kaiser (Chris Penn) - who cleaned the pools of the Trainers
and the Finnigans (and while on the phone spyed through a fence at
skinny-dipping Zoe Trainer)
- jealous surgeon-doctor Dr. Ralph Wyman (Matthew Modine) and redheaded
faithless wife Marian Wyman (Julianne Moore - while naked from the
waist down - confessing her infidelity to her husband as she blow-dried
her dress with a hair-dryer); Dr. Wyman cared for a young boy (a hit-and-run
victim)
- painter's model and housewife Sherri Shepard (Madeleine Stowe), Marian's
sister, who was married to philandering cop Gene Shepard (Tim Robbins)
- he was having an affair with adulterous Betty Weathers (Frances McDormand),
and at one point sexually-harrassed and taunted a female driver - Claire
Kane in her clown makeup
- TV commentator Howard Finnigan (Bruce Davison) and his wife Ann Finnigan
(Andie MacDowell) whose son Casey - on his 8th birthday - was run down
by an automobile and eventually died in the hospital
- Howard's estranged father Paul (Jack Lemmon), who during a visit
with his son at the hospital discussed past infidelities that led to
their estrangement
- Honey Piggot Bush (Lili Taylor), Doreen's daughter, who was married
to Hollywood make-up artist Bill (Robert Downey Jr.), was friends with
young phone-sex mother Lois Kaiser
- sinister, disgruntled and lonely baker Andy Bitkower (Lyle Lovett),
who baked a cake for Casey Finnigan's 8th birthday, who repeatedly
made nasty and anonymous return phone calls about their unclaimed cake
when he was abruptly hung up on by distressed father Howard Finnigan
- ex-husband and helicopter pilot Stormy Weathers (Peter Gallagher)
who, in an enraged state of mind, used a chain-saw to divide up community
property in his ex-wife Betty Weathers' house
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