Todd Haynes' SUPERSTAR: the life and death of Karen Carpenter

[Sam Shapiro]

There was a question yesterday regarding Todd Haynes' (the director of 
SAFE) first film, the legendary one starring Barbie dolls. That film is 
called SUPERSTAR: the Life and Death of Karen Carpenter, and it is indeed 
unavailable, perhaps forever and ever. Starring exclusively Barbie and 
Ken dolls (used brilliantly and disturbingly, I might add), it charts the 
meteroic rise and horrific fall of Karen Carpenter....it is about 45 
minutes long, and the reason it is 'verboten' is because Todd Haynes 
never secured permission from Karen's brother Richard to use the 
Carpenter songs (which are used liberally throughout the short 
film)...perhaps another reason Richard was opposed to the film was 
because he was not, shall we say, portrayed in a very sympathetic light 
in the film....this film is readily available in the video-bootleg 
market, and I highly recommend it (I prize my murky dub)! Haynes second 
film was the David Cronenberg/Jean Genet-influenced POISON, which was a big 
Sundance hit, and a knockout---more powerful than the airless, 
Kubrickesque SAFE.........

--Sam Shapiro