Emerald Cities, completing the trilogy, is a story about a young woman who runs off from her Death Valley home to seek her fortune. Her drunken dad still stuck in his Santa suit from the local Christmas pageant, follows and soon comes in contact with the “new dark ages” of 1984. Juxtapositions of “on-the street” interviews (by Willie Boy Walker), punk performances by bands Flipper and The Mutants, TV shows of past-life hypnotism and nuclear destruction, and a crazed ex-con all finally intermix with the characters’ own sagas. × (DESCRIPTION FROM MUBI. & SEVERAL REVIEWS: <https://mubi.com/en/us/films/emerald-cities>).
EMERALD CITIES was Official Selection for Rotterdam International Film Festival, Everyman Theatre (London), Florence Film Festival (Italy), and VISIONS OF INDEPENDENTS - the 1984 Australian Film Institute seven city tour of "The Cutting Edge of Cinema " from USA, UK, and Australia.
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Review by Nicole (FROM MUBI)
“Nothing short of a punk rock masterpiece and pretty obscure to boot, I'm pissed off at having not seen earlier! This was also a perfect takedown of the sabatoging shit the 80's had to deal with in politics, talk about taking the piss out of it all, with the help of punk rock from FLIPPER. Set in S.F too!, I hope I get to see this film again-on DVD-one day. It's a perfect cult film early x-mas gift, thank you NWR!”
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Directed by
Writing Credits (in alphabetical order)
Ted Falconi...(additional writing), Ed Nylund...(additional writing), Dick Richardson...(co-writer)Rick Schmidt...(co-writer), John Vargo...(additional writing), Willie Boy Walker...(additional writing)
Produced by
Rick Schmidt...producer
Editing by
Sound Department
Nick Bertoni...location sound recording. Mike Fox...music recording
Nick Bertoni-Sound, Bill Kimberlin-Second Camera, Rick Schmidt-co-writer/Director. Trona, CA/Death Valley. ©1979 L.L. Productions. Photo by Julie Schachter.
Camera and Electrical Department
Kathleen Beeler...camera assistant, Bill Kimberlin...additional cinematographer / camera assistant, George Manupelli...additional cinematographer, Julie Schachter...still photographer.
EMERALD CITIES “Opening shot,” (central location), Ridgecrest, Death Valley, CA. (I’m holding curtain (left), Kelly Brock Boen has other end (right), actress Z ready in middle, redy to make acceptance speech, w/Bill Kimberlin on camera. ©1979 L.L. Productions. Photo by Julie Schachter.
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CAST:
Lowell Darling—Politician
Kelly Brock Boen––Miner
Willie Boy Walker––Interviewer/Promoter
Liam Cutchins––Promoter
Debbie Krant––Elf
Freuda Morris––Hypnotist
Ed Nylund––Santa
Arnie Passman––Young Santa
Dick Richardson––Martian
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Lead Actor Carolyn Zaremba (“Z”). ©1979 L.L. Productions. Photo by Julie Schachter.
“Featuring punk bands FLIPPER and THE MUTANTS, this is one of the best films of the year." — L.A. Weekly
"The film is Rick Schmidt’s provocative, and compassionate 'howl' at the gathering tide of nuclear lunacy as the mass media adjusts us to the 'new dark ages' of limited nuclear war. Schmidt’s film style is blending the mad-cap humor of the Marx Brothers, a heady version of American surrealism, and iconoclastic inspiration, perhaps from Jean Luc Godard."
— Vic Skolnick, CINEMA ARTS CENTRE
"As film makers go, Rick Schmidt is right out there on the edge. Average Midwestern movie fans, if confronted by one of Mr. Schmidt’s cinematic visions of lunacy, would no doubt be prompted to ask questions such as, 'What’s it mean?' Such questions are pointless. The best thing to do is sit back and let Mr. Schmidt’s films do what they will. The director likes to slap his audiences around, amuse them, confuse them, toy with them, and leave them with indelible images.
“Mr. Schmidt’s 1983 film, EMERALD CITIES, mixes images of nuclear destruction, the death of Santa Claus, desert isolation, real and fictional politicians (who all seem equally deranged in the film’s context) and punk rock despair in a strange pop-cultural odyssey. It’s all held together by a satirical narrative that savages most of the conventions of American life."
—Robert C. Trussel, KANSAS CITY STAR
ABOUT EMERALD CITIES – remember it's got THE MUTANTS(!) and FLIPPER! (see: theguardian.com/music/musicblog/2007/jul/20/forgottenpunk
Reviews from <https://letterboxd.com/film/emerald-cities/>:
★★★★½ Watched by Harry 29 Nov 2023
“Here is a film fueled on rage in place of a budget, a white-hot lament of a society charging into oblivion and the loss of humanity that comes alongside it.
A blend of news footage of Cold War atrocity and political degradation, on the street interviews, some truly great and extensive footage of punk acts and Proto-Korine meandering through the rot and the pockets of hope buried in the rubble out on the fringes.
“It is only in these pockets of rage and outcry that we're shown any glimmers of a better future - in the punk rockers and the outcasts. In a world where even the colour TV is turning green, infected, it is in these scenes where humanity shines through.
“Emerald Cities pulls no punches, like in Oz, it's a sparkling illusion, a veil to hide a place where innocence can no longer exist, where Santa Claus will be shot dead in the street.”
★★★★½ Watched by Wladimir Uscategui 16 Apr 2022
“Una auténtica joya refundida en el catálogo de Mubi. La historia de un hombre viejo que se disfraza de Santa Claus en un pueblo perdido en el Valle de la Muerte, uno de los lugares más desérticos y hostiles de la Tierra. Aunque enmarcada en el contexto de la Guerra Fría, la amenaza nuclear y los estragos sociales de la era Reagan, no es una película que pretenda ser crítica o reivindicativa. Es un manifiesto punk nihilista (en la cinta participan bandas como The Mutants o los pioneros del grunge Flipper), depresivo y desesperanzado; un vistazo demoledor a un mundo que se fue a la mierda... Una auténtica rareza cinematográfica que combina elementos de cine documental, surrealismo y material de archivo. Formalmente, parece muy modesta pero yo le voy a dar un 9.”
(Wladimir Uscategui review; Translation from Portuguese)
"An authentic piece of jewelry refounded in the Mubi catalogue. The story of a young man who disguises himself as Santa Claus in a lost village in the Valle de la Muerte, one of the most deserted and hostile places in the Tierra. Although framed in the context of the Cold War, the nuclear threat and the social ravages of the Reagan era, it is not a film that intends to be critical or vindictive. It's a nihilistic punk manifesto (bands like The Mutants or grunge pioneers Flipper participate in it), depressive and desperate; A devastating view of a world that has gone to shit... An authentic cinematographic rareness that combines elements of documentary film, surrealism and archival material. Formally, it looks very modest but I'm going to give it a 9."“Mr. Rick Schmidt’s Emerald Cities played San Francisco’s venerable Roxie Theatre in the Mission district on Saturday night as part of their punk movie series – this was Part Two of their survey, entitled Post-Punk 1983-1990, This Must Be the Place. The 9:30PM show was well attended, with several stars and band members in person, and got off to a strong start with all the bluster that punk bands The Mutants and Flipper can level on an audience. And it was a blast. Mr. Schmidt’s juxtapositions were sometimes hilarious, other times savage, strange, and historical. He switches deftly from images of Christmas in Death Valley, including an old, half-drunk part-time Santa played by Ed Nylund at his feisty finest, to ‘Santa’s twenty-something daughter (Carolyn Zaremba) chomping at the bit to see a world beyond their green-tinted, broken TV.”
It took me a few years (until 1983) to shoot enough good stuff to cut a full movie. Bands THE MUTANT and FLIPPER were shot LIVE at Joe Rees’ studio/TARGET VIDEO, 1979, in San Francisco (THANKS AGAIN JOE!): <https://www.discogs.com/label/25992-Target-Video?page=1>. Joe also shot video for the “Past-life Therapy class” scene (1982) with Ed Nylund/Santa and Dick Richardson/Martian mask.
Artist Billy Hiebert, an expert at mould-making, resin, marble, etc., created the mask originally for his own use at his Oakland, CA studio, and then loaned it to me for the movie (THANKS AGAIN BILLY!: <https://www.facebook.com/HiebertSculpture/?paipv=0&eav=AfaJkyQUDRf6NfbhQH74Crq4MnOFgY6xQelWn_xvrBfaSB0IJAyLq3ta3fp5X7Piivo&_rdr>).
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Here’s a companion book I wrote, about “the making of” EMERALD CITIES, beginning with the 3-day film shoot in Ridgecrest, Death Valley, 1979.
(From Sujewa Ekanayake website: <https://diyfilmmaker.blogspot.com/2020/08/new-rick-schmidt-book-new-dark-ages-how.html>
Legendary indie filmmaker and authorRick Schmidt- creator of over25 feature films, and the great indie filmmaking book Feature Filmmaking At Used Car Prices and several other books, has a new book out.
On New Dark Ages, fromAmazon page- "NEW DARK AGES lets the reader participate in Rick's IMPROV decision-making process as he applies his stream-of-consciousness approach to solving moviemaking problems, where the filmmaker must battle his/her movie into existence, often with little money and little time to complete the task. Readers can learn from Rick's "open universe" approach, where he dares to proceed against all odds."
More on the book here, and get the book at the link - https://www.amazon.com/AGES-How-Movie-EMERALD-CITIES-IMPROV/dp/1715001117
(FREE On Kindle: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B08FZRB93P
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