THE RASMUSSEN DISASTERS

A mobile of contemporary U.S.A.--situation satire--a misHappening sadly without any of the really funny touches which disarmingly distinguished Mr. Leigh's What Can You Do and Downstairs at Ramsey's. But then the material is much less attractive. Charley Rasmussen who runs a liquor store and Ann, who runs his house through a film of detergents and deodorizers, live in a small ""neoplasmic community"" in Los Angeles called Westpark. With their son David, nineteen, and daughter twelve, Margie, in a relatively hostile and unyielding fashion. Until the visitation of Uncle Bernie, Charley's brother, a very hairy type in every sense of the word who stages a fright scene all one night during which everyone gets zonked and everything is revealed--such as Ann's Sunday husband, the nice integrated Negro next door. Shatteringly noisy and the exaggerated overkill submerges Mr. Leigh's genuinely comic talent.