SOMETHING WILD June 23rd at Webster University ‘A Tribute to Jonathan Demme’

“You were right. I’m a rebel. I am! I just channeled my rebellion into the mainstream.”

SOMETHING WILD screens Friday, June 23rd at Webster University’s Moore Auditorium (470 East Lockwood). This is the fifth film in their ‘Tribute to Jonathan Demme’ The movie starts at 8:00pm.

Director Jonathan Demme’s SOMETHING WILD (1986) more than lives up to its title. This rolicking, road trip melodrama about coincidences and happenstances features a slippery-fingered bohemian babe, a staid businessman, and a psychotic criminal on the lam. Charlie Driggs (Jeff Daniels) neglects to pay his bill one day, and a complete stranger, Lulu (Melanie Griffith) confronts him about it outside of the restaurant. Afterward, Lulu takes the hopelessly conventional Charlie on a wild ride that concludes with her handcuffing him to a bed in a sleazy motel and tearing off his clothes. Impulse prompts them to careen off with Charlie still wearing the cuffs. Eventually, they collide with Lulu’s ex, a sadistic, uninhibited parolee, Ray Sinclair (Ray Liotta) who epitomizes recklessness.

The first half of the action depicts the lunacy of Charlie and Lulu right down to an impromptu meeting with Lulu’s mother, while the second half waxes conventional with Ray and his criminal exploits. Liotta steals the show with an electrifying performance as an unhinged, gun-toting, ex-convict on parole. He is a force to be reckoned with and shows no qualms of giving into his violent urges. Ray makes a hypnotic villain and the confrontation between Charlie and he at the former’s suburban residence will have you screaming for Ray’s death (or maybe Charlies). The thing about SOMETHING WILD is its unpredictable passion. You don’t have any idea where it is going, even when it turns formulaic during its second half. Having Melanie Griffith running around naked the whole movie doesn’t hurt, but even on that note there’s a weird realistic edge to all the sexuality in the film. It’s unbelievably sexy without being dirty, cliché’, or overdone. So revisit this little gem when it screens Friday night at Webster University.

Admission is:

$6 for the general public
$5 for seniors, Webster alumni and students from other schools
$4 for Webster University staff and faculty

Free for Webster students with proper I.D.

Here’s the rest of the line-up for the other films that will be part of the ‘Tribute to Jonathan Demme’:
6/24 – Married to the Mob (1988)
6/30 – The Silence of the Lambs (1991)
7/1 –  Philadelphia (1993)