Tag: Sugar Town

The hardships encountered and overcome by director Allison Anders are often reflected in the grittiness and strength of her female characters, a quality that lends her stories a tough but refreshing honesty. Anders cares about her characters, but she refuses to give them falsely happy endings and this refusal distinguishes her from other directors of so-called women’s films who make their movies into little more than celluloid Hallmark cards. Anders’ approach to this kind of storytelling has given her distinction in the film industry and she continues to make films that challenge conventional attitudes toward both women and films about women.

Born November 16, 1954, in Ashland, KY, Anders had an upbringing that was nothing if not traumatic. At the age of five, she, her mother, and four sisters were abandoned by her father, and were forced into an unstable, itinerant lifestyle. At the age of 12, Anders was raped and then endured abuse from her stepfather, who at one point threatened her with a gun. Anders suffered a mental breakdown when she was 15 years old, after her mother took her daughters to Los Angeles to escape further abuse. Following time in psychiatric wards, later in foster homes and jail, Anders ventured back to Kentucky, then moved to London with the man who would father her daughter.

Imagine “The Last Picture Show” shot in color and shaped by a rueful feminine perspective, in a place where women are hopelessly anchored while the men drift through like tumbleweed. The becalmed town of Laramie, N.M., is the setting in which Nora (Brooke Adams), a hard-working waitress with a knowing, generous grin, has tried to bring up her two unruly daughters.

In “Mi Vida Loca My Crazy Life,” Allison Anders tries what few directors would have had the interest or intelligence to think of. She looks beyond the surface of the lives of Hispanic girl gangs and attempts to create a deeper portrait of young women in the Echo Park section of Los Angeles. They use gang names, like Sad Girl, Mousie and Whisper. And though violence is part of their lives, they are likely to be teen-age mothers struggling to get by.

The story—what little there is—revolves around a witches’ coven trying to resurrect the spirit of a stripper. All the ingredients (mother’s milk, virgin’s blood, sweat of five men’s thighs, and a year’s tears) are ready except for a sperm sample. Since witch Eva (Ione Skye) failed in her assignment to bring this vital component of the mixture, she is charged with seducing Ted and getting what she needs from him.