The "life flashing before their eyes" genre of storytelling is usually met with the general criticism of lazy writing. But when it's done well, as "Jacob's Ladder" was in 1990, the result can be disorienting and bleak in the best of ways. Written by "Ghost" scribe Bruce Joel Rubin, the Adrian Lyne-directed psychological drama concerns Jacob Singer (Tim Robbins), a Vietnam vet beset by increasingly grotesque visions, plunging him into a hellscape in which the veil between reality and lunacy wears thin. The movie enjoyed mild box office success, but a robust afterlife as a cult masterpiece.
Few are more excited about the film's sustained success than Lyne, who spoke to Coming Soon on the 30th anniversary of its release and compared its experience to that of reading an Ambrose Bierce short story for the first time (which was adapted into one of Lyne's favorite movies):
"There was a...
Few are more excited about the film's sustained success than Lyne, who spoke to Coming Soon on the 30th anniversary of its release and compared its experience to that of reading an Ambrose Bierce short story for the first time (which was adapted into one of Lyne's favorite movies):
"There was a...
- 9/27/2022
- by Anya Stanley
- Slash Film
An Academy Award-winning short film produced in France, this dreamy, nearly-silent dramatization of a story by Ambrose Bierce starts with a man about to be hanged over a river. The Twilight Zone, Episode #142: "An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge" (original air date Feb. 28, 1964) The Plot: A sentence of death is about to be carried out. On a bridge above a river, a noose is looped over the girders and a man (Roger Jacquet), bound by rope, awaits his execution. The plank on which he is standing is kicked out, he plummets downward, the rope tightens ... ... and then it breaks. Underwater, the man cannot believe he is still alive. He frees himself from the rope that ties his hands and swims...
- 1/17/2012
- Screen Anarchy
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