This long unseen and recently restored gem from filmmaker Michael Roemer (The Plot Against Harry, Nothing But a Man) centres Brooke Adams (Days of Heaven, Invasion of the Body Snatchers) in a study of fraught relationships within the American family unit. After returning to her East Coast childhood home to find her adoptive mother distant and her half-sister liberated, Jo (Adams) befriends her neighbours whose marriage is troubled by alcoholism and mental illness.

Michael Roemer is one of the best-kept secrets in American independent cinema - his tender 1964 debut Nothing But a Man was reportedly Malcolm X’s favourite film, while 1969’s New York Jewish farce The Plot Against Harry was withdrawn from the public eye by Roemer himself after dismal early audience reactions only to find acclaim when it was officially released twenty years later. Originally aired on PBS in 1984 under the title “Haunted” but retitled for its recent re-release, the harrowing, darkly comic Vengeance is Mine is high melodrama played with Roemer’s usual eye for authenticity and nuance at every turn – playing like John Cassavetes directing a James L. Brooks script (or “Ingmar Bergman by way of peak Phil Donahue”, according to Wesley Morris in the New York Times). Aided by phenomenal performances from Adams and Van Devere as the two troubled women at its centre, this is no mere curio but a major rediscovery.
–Ian Barr, Slide Whistle

Slide Whistle is the new screening imprint of local film critic and programmer Ian Barr, highlighting forgotten and neglected films: high, low and in-between.