MS. 45

The legendary, surreal revenge classic is here at last. New York’s Abel Ferrara has made some of the most unusual and fascinating exploitation films in history. In it, a mute garment-district worker Thana (the immortal Zoe Tamerlis) is brutalized once too often and hits the streets with a pistol, seeking vengeance. The grand finale at her company Halloween party is one of the great sequences ever. Though MS. 45 has a sterling reputation among academics and scholars, it was made for a rough audience of Times Square theater goers, many of whom were gross, sexist males, exactly the type Thana set her sites on. Throughout there’s a fascinating tension. This is one of the ten or twenty essential classics of revenge cinema. (Lars)