Screenplay (Barry Purves, U.K., 1992). An exquisite kabuki performance in miniature. A tiny rotating stage is the wondrous site for the unexpectedly expressive puppetry and fusuma screens. (11 mins, Color, 35mm, From BFI) ------------------ In Julie Taymor's startling rendition of the Stravinsky opera, there are two Oedipuses. One, attired in a costume with soaring shoulders, a Minoan headdress, and large sculpted hands, performs the traditional part of the King of Thebes. The other-a butoh dancer encrusted with layers of clay-parodies Oedipus's every gesture. He is a full-scale puppet, a man not in command of his movements. The other is a king, but also a puppet to the angry gods who have delivered him to his tragic fate. Taymor, widely known for her ambitious puppet theater, has slyly accented an essential mechanism of Greek tragedy, that man is but a plaything tugging against the strings of fate. Only through the self-recognition of Oedipus's crimes can the puppet shed its sodden shell to reveal the fully rendered man beneath. Designed for a Japanese festival, Taymor's staging includes sculptures and a benshi-like narrator. With Jessye Norman as Jocasta, Philip Langridge as Oedipus, and Min Tanaka as the Oedipus dancer.-Steve Seid