The first time I saw Box of Moonlight was at the 1996 Toronto International Film Festival, where it immediately followed an 8am press screening of Peter Greenaway's ludicrous The Pillow Book (a film that seems to start over from the beginning every ten minutes). Sadly, The Pillow Book left many of my peers deflated, so that by the time Box of Moonlight unspooled, several audience members had taken off to find Greenaway--and kill him; others were still sound asleep. A more mismatched pairing one couldn't devise. To those who missed it then, or skipped its very limited theatrical release, I implore you to seek out this unique and gentle film on videocassette or, especially, DVD. Better yet, pair up Box of Moonlight with its writer-director Tom DiCillo's other overlooked gem, The Real Blonde, for a double-bill that really crackles. The two pictures represent flipsides of a skewed sensibility.

Box of Moonlight is the story of Al Fountain (John Turturro, navigating his retentive role with aplomb), an electrical engineer in the throes mid-life crisis. After the installation of new turbines at a Knoxville windshield wiper factory is cut short, job supervisor Al, instead of heading straight back to his wife and young son, decides to rent a car and spend some time at Splatchee Lake, a vacation spot from his childhood that has since dried up. Shaken by this into finally returning home, along the way Al encounters a livewire in coonskin named "Kid" (Sam Rockewell). Unforeseen circumstances keep Al and Kid together for a fourth of July celebration that neither of them will soon forget.

Near the beginning of the film, Al scolds his employees for wasting the last fifteen minutes of a workday on a game of baseball; he taps an oversize clock to stress his point. Al is obsessed with running out of time: what is his subconscious telling him when he imagines a glass of water filtering itself back into the jug or the morning coffee falling upwards towards the spout of the pot? Al, too, pressures his boy, Bobby (Alexander Goodwin), to get a head-start on becoming an engineer, forcing Bobby to practice flashcards in his absence when Bobby justs wants to spend his summer vacation doing little boy things. (Every time Al calls home he gives Bobby a math drill and denies him permission to light firecrackers on Independence Day.) It takes Al his time with Kid (whose name suggests the projection of Al's inner child) to figure out he's simply running in circles both literal (he borrows from "Circle Rent-A-Car" and drives in circles to get to Splatchee Lake) and figurative (he wants Bobby to follow in his footsteps).

No mere walking symbol, Kid is equal parts exhibitionist, storyteller, and wide-eyed innocent. Impetuous Kid complements Al: his eccentric passions (like the stealing of lawn dwarfs) are an appropriate juxtaposition to Al's dedication. Rockwell's performance is imaginative and not as telegraphed as its amplitude suggests; the actor lets seep Kid's loneliness and various insecurities, and the character feeds off Al's reservedness. (The same might be said of the chemistry basic between Rockwell and Turturro.) Besides, every good wacko needs a straight man. Their friendship is sweet, and when they do inevitably part ways, it's every bit as touching as one hopes.

The film's final shots really tug at the heartstrings. DiCillo manages the seemingly impossible: although Box of Moonlight is littered with profanity, nudity, adultery, violence, and allusions to murder, we are left hard-pressed to call it anything but charming or endearing. DiCillo understands that America might just be rotten to the core, yet he's a born optimist, and his protagonists always come out on top. As an aside, for indie filmmakers to be anything but optimistic, with all the challenges they face, is counterproductive.

Which leads me to The Real Blonde, a picture that DiCillo directed during the gruelling period of getting Box of Moonlight distributed; an ensemble piece about struggling careerists in New York, The Real Blonde is far removed from its predecessor, an obvious artistic palette-cleanser. Matthew Modine and Catherine Keener (so underrated an actress; her work in Walking And Talking set the film apart from such other two verb-title Gen-X pity pleas as Kicking And Screaming) are Joe, a part-time waiter, and Mary, a make-up designer, respectively. Their relationship of late lacks sexual dynamite.

Maxwell Caulfield is Bob, a trained actor suffering through the starring role in the cheeseball soap "Passion Crest." He's obsessed with finding a woman with blonde pubic hair--a real blonde--which leads him into the arms of both Daryl Hannah (as his slutty co-star), and gorgeous Bridgette Wilson, who plays a "spiritual" supermodel. (Wilson connects with the divine through Walt Disney cartoons.) The Real Blonde's framing device is a nearly wordless and oddly moving sub-plot involving a TV-addicted, elderly black woman and her missing mutt.

The Real Blonde is more satirical than Box of Moonlight, as you may have already surmised. Several potshots are taken at daytime television, the movie biz (in one of my favourite scenes, a producer tells Joe at an audition, "You play a serial killer," and casting director Kathleen Turner purrs, "A very sexy serial killer"), rock videos (a Madonna shoot is covered by "eMpTyV"--okay, that's lame), the modelling biz (Marlo Thomas is resurrected to send-up fashion photographers; her clients include such perfume companies as "Depression For Women" and "Henri Facade"), and male attitudes in general. Mary is bothered enough by being hit on everywhere she goes that she seeks therapy (she's doomed with Buck Henry as her shrink) and signs up for self-defense classes. When Joe decries sexism in advertising, however, Mary goes on the defense, arguing in favour of women flaunting their sensuality.

The Real Blonde is bigger than parody, though. It defies our expectations at every turn: a phone call to Joe from Madonna becomes a key mystery; Bob's fetish makes him prone to violence; Mary is barely proud of the fact that her boyfriend is an extremely moral and caring person and fixates on his financial woes... In fact, The Real Blonde is a much more satisfying experience than the recent, critically overpraised The Opposite Of Sex, a movie that substitutes cynicism for laughs. DiCillo is not satisfied with stuffing clever dialogue in his cast's collective mouth: he steers his gallery of rogues towards a finish that rewards. As is the case with Box of Moonlight, Blonde really pays off at its optimistic (and symmetrical) conclusion.

I'm very much anticipating Tom DiCillo's next movie. The quirkiness of his tales (from their characters to their imagery--eg., the absurd, thematically important placement of a ceramic deer amongst the brush in Box of Moonlight) feels unforced, genuine. If more budding auteurs followed his idiosyncratic example, MovieLand would be a better place.

Box Of Moonlight has been available on DVD for awhile now. Trimark's treatment of this three million-dollar pic is decent. The warm, earth tones of cinematographer Paul Ryan's pallette are beautifully reproduced, but the overall (non-anamorphic 1.85:1) image is too soft. Various texture--ripples on the water or the fur of Kid's Davy Crockett cap, for instance--cry out for higher-defnition. The lack of clarity is the disc's only dead-giveaway as to the film's low-budget roots. On the audio end of the spectrum, the Dolby Surround track features few surround effects, and Jim Farmer's music sounds lush and full. In all honesty, simple stereo would suffice Box of Moonlight.

Most surprisingly, the Box of Moonlight DVD includes a commentary track by DiCillo--surprising given that this supplement is not advertised anywhere on the disc's packaging. (Only the film's trailer is listed as a bonus item.) DiCillo largely reiterates what was stated in his Faber and Faber book Box of Moonlight & Notes from Overboard: A Film-maker's Diary (a fun read for aspiring DiCillos), and sometimes he overexplains what is perfectly evident when staring at the screen (character motivations and such). Overall, however, he's quite listenable.

Because The Real Blonde is a Paramount title, no such bonuses exist on its DVD. Like Box of Moonlight, it also lacks 16x9 enhancement (what's the deal, Paramount? Trimark we can forgive because they don't have Titanic profits sitting in a bank). Letterboxed at 1.85:1, Blonde is on a par with The Truman Show in terms of audio-visual quality. Blacks are crisp and the bright colours lend some shots a three-dimensional appearance. (Whites are a little hot at times, so the contrast is not perfect.) Some solarization occurs during the opening credits (the edges of light patterns and extremely unfocused shots still seem to give compressionists a hard time), but no noticeable artifacts appeared thereafter.

Soundwise, both the Dolby 5.1 and Dolby Surround tracks are sensational; The Real Blonde has a more active soundtrack than I expected. Here, Jim Farmer's bassy score really breathes. (Soundtrack switching can be performed on the fly with the remote; Paramount has still placed the 2.0 audio on the default track.)

The only extra on The Real Blonde disc is a trailer, which features a few shots that didn't make it into the final cut. (Some of the episodic The Real Blonde feels like it's missing something; Box Of Moonlight is the more complete experience.) The preview is appetizing, and it's a shame Paramount had no idea what they had on their hands. The studio marketed the star-fuelled The Real Blonde as an art-house affair, sending it to an early and unjust grave. I hope that it gathers momentum on home video, thus showing the studio the error of its ways.-Bill Chambers