The Linguini Incident

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The Linguini Incident
The Linguini Incident.jpg
Directed by Richard Shepard
Written byTamar Brott
Richard Shepard
Produced bySarah Jackson
Arnold Orgolini
Starring Rosanna Arquette
David Bowie
Eszter Balint
Marlee Matlin
Buck Henry
Viveca Lindfors
Cinematography Robert Yeoman
Edited bySonya Polonsky
Music by Thomas Newman
Distributed byAcademy Entertainment
Release dates
  • October 30, 1991 (1991-10-30)(France)
  • May 1, 1992 (1992-05-01)(United States)
Running time
98 minutes
CountryUnited States
LanguageEnglish

The Linguini Incident (also released on home video as Houdini and Company, The Robbery, Shag-O-Rama) is a 1991 American crime comedy film set in New York starring Rosanna Arquette and David Bowie. The film was directed by Richard Shepard, who co-wrote the script with Tamar Brott. The title refers to linguini, a type of pasta.

Contents

Plot

A British bartender, Monte (David Bowie), wishes to marry a waitress at the restaurant he works, ostensibly so he can obtain his green card. Waitress and aspiring escape artist, Lucy (Rosanna Arquette), and hopeful lingerie designer Vivian (Eszter Balint), wish to rob Monte's and Lucy's employer in order to fund their ambitions. Monte agrees to help the duo rob the restaurant so long as Lucy marries him. While the robbery does not go precisely according to plan, the trio are successful. However, Lucy accidentally leaves Monte at the altar, causing him to lose a two million dollar bet with the restaurant owners that he could marry a waitress in a week. In a double or nothing scenario, Monte wagers Lucy's skills as an escape artist. He tricks the women into playing along, claiming that the bosses found out about the robbery. The women appear to forgive him for lying about the circumstances of the escape performance. The two women rob the restaurant a second time. The relationship of the women and Monte remains ambiguous in the end.

Cast

Iman and Julian Lennon have cameos [1]

Production

The movie was shot in late 1990, after Bowie had completed his Sound+Vision Tour. [2] [3] It was co-funded by Bowie's own production company, Isolar. [2]

Release

Different edits of the film were shown internationally under the titles The Linguini Incident, Houdini & Company, The Robbery, The Incident, and Shag-O-Rama. An assembly cut was released in Europe and Asia while a cut by the producers was released in the United States and Canada. The film was released in the United States on the weekend of the Rodney King riot. [4]

Critical response

In Los Angeles, where the Los Angeles Times had called the film "an off the wall treat" there was a curfew so box office was obviously disappointing despite the fact that The New York Times called the film a "cheerfully bizarre comedy". It was released on VHS in 1992, and again in January 2000 on DVD with the name Shag-O-Rama, The Robbery, and Houdini and Company. [2] While reviews were mixed, many critics praised the film for its humor and avant-garde surrealism. Janet Maslin of The New York Times wrote that the film "trumpets its eccentricity with its title and casting, as well as in every other way it can". [5] Similarly, Los Angeles Times staff writer Kevin Thomas called the film "a rarity, a contemporary screwball comedy that actually works". [6] In contrast, Empire magazine gave the movie 1 star out of 5, calling it "an unbearably protracted dud", [7] while TV Guide gave the movie 2 stars out of 5. [8] Variety magazine called the movie an "uninspired, poverty row production" and lamented the miscasting of Bowie in the lead role. [1] Bowie biographer Nicholas Pegg called the movie "harmless but negligible", with a "misconceived script and turgid direction." [2]

Legacy

Since its initial release, the film has garnered a cult following of fans who have come to appreciate its bizarre humor, surreal tone, and relative obscurity. On October 4, 2022, Collider called it "a hidden gem in Bowie's filmography" and "the best kind of cinematic comfort food". [9] In March of 2020, film reviewer Virginie Pronovost wrote "it keeps you entertained from the beginning until the end with its humour, its peripeties and the overall aura of excitement". [10] Affirming fan appreciation for the film's obscurity, one 2013 review from Mutant Reviewers says "here on my Island of Misfit Movies, The Linguini Incident lives on in a special place of honor". [11]

In 2021, Shepard was approached to make a director's cut of the film for a Blu-ray release. The rights to the film were initially held by Academy Entertainment, but it went bankrupt and sold its film library to another company that went bankrupt. The Linguini Incident was one of several films whose copyright was claimed by the Screen Actors Guild. Shepard had to find a print and faced difficulties as SAG did not have any and both the European distributor and processing lab went bankrupt. Shepard was able to find a 35 mm print of the film in 2022 through a Zurich art theater. [12] On August 8, 2023, Shepard announced on his Twitter account that he had recovered the rights to the film and remastered it in 4K with a director's cut. The recut premiered at Vidiots on May 9, 2024 [13] and the BluRay release is scheduled for 2024. [14]

See also

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References

  1. 1 2 Cohn, Lawrence (May 4, 1992). "Review: The Linguini Incident". Variety . Los Angeles, California: Penske Media Corporation . Retrieved February 20, 2015.
  2. 1 2 3 4 Pegg 2016, p. 676.
  3. ↑ Shepard 2024, p. 22.
  4. ↑ Shepard 2024, pp. 22–23.
  5. ↑ Maslin, Janet (May 1, 1992). "Movies: The Linguini Incident". The New York Times . New York City. Retrieved May 15, 2024.
  6. ↑ Thomas, Kevin (May 1, 1992). "MOVIE REVIEW : 'Linguini' a Modern Screwball Comedy". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved October 20, 2022.
  7. ↑ "Reviews: The Linguini Incident". London, England: Bauer Media Group. 1 January 2000. Retrieved 20 February 2015.
  8. ↑ "The Linguini Incident (Review)". TV Guide . New York City: CBS Corporation . Retrieved February 20, 2015.
  9. ↑ Boccella, Maggie (Oct 4, 2022). "Why David Bowie's Zaniest, Most Underrated Film Role Is 'The Linguini Incident'". Collider. Retrieved October 20, 2022.
  10. ↑ Pronovost, Virginie (Mar 11, 2020). "David Bowie on Screen: The Linguini Incident (Richard Shepard, 1991)". The Wonderful World of Cinema. Retrieved October 20, 2022.
  11. ↑ "The Linguini Incident (1991)". Mutant Reviewers. Jun 17, 2013. Retrieved October 20, 2022.
  12. ↑ Shepard 2024, pp. 23–24.
  13. ↑ "The Linguini Incident – Director's Cut". Vidiots. Retrieved 2024-05-10.
  14. ↑ Shepard 2024, p. 25.

Works cited

Further reading

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