So

The past few days have been too hectic for me, between the NFL draft going on and the UFC show going on tomorrow, my next review isn't going up tonight, but rather on Monday.

Gordon's War

Gordon’s War (1973)

Runtime: 90 minutes

Directed by: Ossie Davis

Starring: Paul Winfield, Carl Lee, David Downing, Tony King, Grace Jones

From: 20th Century Fox

So, how did I spend my Easter? It wasn’t too exciting, but I had a traditional ham dinner… and I also watched an obscure blaxploitation film starring the late character actor Paul Winfield and directed by the late actor Ossie Davis from a VHS tape as I taped it off of Fox Movie Channel quite a few months ago. Only I would do such a thing, I know. Anyhow, it has never been on DVD but will finally come out on June 14th via Shout Factory in a double-bill with a late 80’s movie known as Off Limits.

Although, if you want to see it and don’t want to wait for DVD or it appearing once in a blue moon on Fox Movie Channel, you can always use YouTube… don’t tell anyone I sent you there, though.

Anyhow, the plot is quite simple yet effective. Gordon (Winfield, clean-shaven and not as heavy-set) returns from a tour of duty in Vietnam. He finds out his wife passes away due to a heroin overdose. He’s upset that his Harlem neighborhood has been ravaged by drugs, so he and three pals get together to try and rid the area of drugs and crime. That’s about it for the plot.

But, despite the simple plot, the movie is a lot of fun. The cast does a nice job, there’s a variety of action from shootouts to a nice bit where a motorcycle gets chased throughout Harlem by a car, and some LOL moments, including a creative usage of a can of deodorant spray as a weapon, and the gimmick of soldiers at work is displayed in the systematic way they take out the bad guys (and you get to see that the drug dealers aren’t the top villains). There are also familiar blaxploitation trappings, from the funky music to the laughable in 2011 clothing to the hairdos and all the slang.

By the way, Grace Jones’ role in the movie only lasts for seconds but I mention it as you get to see her nude (if you ever had the desire to see her topless, you’re in luck) and Gordon calls her a bitch. That made me laugh for some reason.

I’ll be back Friday night with a new review.

Serpico

Serpico (1973)

Runtime: 129 minutes

Directed by: Sidney Lumet (RIP)

Starring: Al Pacino, Tony Roberts, Barbara Eda-Young, Allan Rich

From: Paramount

Now, here’s some more classic fare. This is something I recorded off of TCM when they aired it one night. I stumbled upon it this week and it was perfect, as director Lumet of course passed away just two weeks ago, and up to this point, I had only seen one of his movies before-Before The Devil Knows You’re Dead-so this would be a nice second film. Plus, the movie came from producer Dino De Laurentiis, who also recently passed away, so it serves in that fashion too.

So, now that I’ve seen it, I can agree with the consensus that it’s great. This true story was based on the story of Frank Serpico (Pacino), who was a cop in New York City who was best described as a nonconformist and he ended up in undercover, so that he can dress up in hippie clothing and sport some great hair, facial and otherwise. He soon discovers that corruption is rampant and he always refuses to take money even though he gets asked to take it often. That labels him as someone who is untrustworthy so that causes much stress and trouble with his personal life and his lady friends. He tries to go to higher authorities to stop the corruption, but he runs into trouble there. I won’t reveal more, but you can always just look up his life story if you don’t know it and haven’t seen the film.

As I said, the movie’s pretty great and it’s no wonder it’s become a classic. Everything about it is quality, from the direction to (I presume, anyway) the telling of the true story, and I’ll guess what was on the screen was mostly factual. I can’t gripe about any of the performances, and the Mikis Theodorakis score works. But, the highlight in this naturally dramatic story is Pacino in the lead. He’s not like current day Al (or even recent Al either) where he’s at 11 most of the team and spends a lot of time SHOUTING and over-acting. While he does do some SHOUTING, it’s definitely a nuanced performance where he goes through a range of emotions while dealing with an extraordinarily difficult situation. This is quality filmmaking.

I do have to mention that there is some comedy involved. What got a huge laugh out of me was one scene involving Serpico and another cop playing Peeping Tom in the bathroom; they had the lights off to do this. Their Lieutenant (James Tolkan; yep, the bald guy who was the principal in the Back to the Future movies, along with being in the likes of Top Gun and Masters of the Universe; he looked pretty much the same back then as he did in the 80’s) walks in and accuses Serpico-in a profane manner-of being a homosexual. I won’t repeat the dialogue but I found it to be hilarious, as it was Tolkan who was saying those profane things. So yeah, if you haven’t seen this movie, you should.

I’ll be back Monday night.

Up In Smoke

Up In Smoke (1978)

Runtime: 85 minutes

Directed by: Lou Adler

Starring: Cheech Marin, Tommy Chong, Stacy Keach, Tom Skerritt

From: Paramount

Well, because today is 4:20-I presume everyone knows what the significance of today is in terms of one aspect of the counterculture-I figured it would only be appropriate to review a movie revolving around marijuana and its consumption, and this is the most appropriate movie I have in my DVD collection. Hey, I’m not a pot user; I have it as it’s a funny film that you can enjoy sober. Although, if you know people who like to smoke up (as I do; the number of people in that category will remain a secret) it does make things more amusing. I watched this last night instead of today as I have things planned for today.

The thing is, there isn’t too much to say about the movie. The storyline is pretty threadbare and it’s really a series of sketches strung together, but like I said it’s usually pretty amusing. You can tell that Cheech and Chong had been a comedy team together for years before they made this flick; the repartee is pretty clear. In the movie, you get to see how they meet up and become pals (Chong moves away from his rich parents; from the dad you get the now-classic line “Finkelstein-shit-kid”, so there’s that) and their frequent run-ins with the cops.

They meet up with a wacky variety of people, including Strawberry (Skerritt) with a giant birthmark on his face and a victim of Vietnam War trauma. But the main story ends up being Cheech & Chong accidentally being deported to Mexico and coming back to L.A. in order to compete in a band competition and unbeknownst to them, the van they’re using is entirely made out of pot. This causes them to get followed by the wacky Sgt. Stedenko (Keach), leading to a finale that’s odd at times, but still funny.

So, this movie filled with goofy (yet entertaining) humor-not to mention some catchy music-is perfect for this day, although you don’t have to be a stoner to enjoy this. If you don’t have that around-the movie that is, not marijuana-Cheech & Chong’s Next Movie isn’t a bad substitute, in my eyes. The other movies… I’ve seen clips of, and that was enough to tell me not to watch them in full.

I’ll be back Friday night.

An Evening With Edward James Olmos & Stand And Deliver

Stand and Deliver (1988)

Runtime: 103 minutes

Directed by: Ramon Menendez

Starring: Edward James Olmos, Lou Diamond Phillips, Andy Garcia, Rosanna DeSoto

From: Warner Brothers

Here’s a movie that I got to see on the big screen due to the Florida Film Festival. They were showing this film on the big screen, AND the star of the film, Mr. Olmos, would be there in person and afterwards he would do a Q&A. It sounded so interesting that I figured I would go and see it, and after that I’ll see another movie (the review of which I’ll post the next night)* in order to show some love to the FFF. Before that, though, this movie, which I hadn’t seen before but I knew was based on the true story of Bolivian-born teacher Jaime Escalante, who used innovative techniques to help students in an inner-city school in learn such things as algebra and calculus. Mr. Escalante ended up passing away about a year ago.

• At least that was the initial plan. It turns out, I only saw this movie on Friday night, as the Q&A afterwards went way longer than expected. Mr. Olmos is quite loquacious, to say the least. So, it turns out I’ll be back on Wednesday night with a new review.

As for this film, it’s quality stuff. It’s quite inspiring to see this true story be told. It does sound incredible that Mr. Escalante was able to do so well in teaching something complex to high school kids with troubled backgrounds, but it’s all true… technically, I’ve heard that the movie is “90% true”, but in Hollywood that might as well be 100%. It was done through a lot of extra hours being put in and it caused stress for the students and for the teacher, but through that it was done. I’ll admit that at times the teacher came across as kind of an ass, but I guess that many professors/teachers can seem that way, and the students could be asses too.

The definite highlight of the movie was the performance of Edward James Olmos in the lead. As he said in the Q&A afterwards, he did perfect mimicry of Escalante… even putting his hands down his pants often as if he was Al Bundy. There’s definitely humor to go along with all of the drama too. I do have to personally laugh that Phillips’ character always had the phrase “F*CK YOU” written on his knuckles and you saw it often enough, and yet the movie was still rated PG. Go figure.

Well, I don’t want to give too much away if you don’t know the story, so it’s a movie worth seeing, I say.

As for the Q&A afterwards, which went over an hour and a half (!):

He talked about a variety of things, from more info about Stand and Deliver to his background and life in L.A. to his social activism and he stated that, among other things:

* Selena was the most difficult film he worked on. Not just because it was done soon after she died, but because her father was on set for most of the filming (and that was the role Olmos played) and after every scene he saw he would break down crying due to the memories of the past.
* He really enjoyed Zoot Suit, a movie I remember being pimped hard on some sort of messageboard
* His Blade Runner talk mainly was about his character and the language he spoke. According to him, one of the phrases he stated in the movie was Hungarian for "big horse dick!"
* He ended it by talking about Battlestar Galactica. That's a show I've never watched, but I know it has many hardcore fans. He was proud of the show and how it was intelligent instead of being all about creatures.
* One of the questions asked from the crowd was rather interesting. The lady sitting next to me (no, it wasn't anyone I knew) got on her iPhone during the Q&A and asked Lou Diamond Phillips on Twitter a question to ask. No kidding. It turns out that the two recently did another film together, a low-budget movie still in post-production called Filly Brown.

Oh yeah, and the best for last... his experience with Miami Vice. He mentioned how it took a lot of effort from Michael Mann to even get him on the show, as he wanted creative control over his character and he wanted to take off time whenever to work on various projects. Finally, Mann agreed to those terms. He mentioned that recently he met up Philip Michael Thomas for the first time since the show ended. No kidding. Then, he finished by talking about how in his first day on set, he and Don Johnson had a big blowup over their first scene together over a minor thing. Also, I'm sure it's been noted before somewhere but in the first ten episodes he appeared on, he never looked Crockett or Tubbs in the eye. That's a thing to look out for.

So yep, Friday night was a blast. Like I said, I'll be back Wednesday night.

13 Assassins

13 Assassins (Jusan-nin no shikaku) (2010)

Runtime: 126 minutes (in Japan, it’s 141 minutes)

Directed by: Takashi Miike

Starring: Koji Yakusho, Takayuki Yamada, Yusuke Iseya, Goro Inagaki

From: Sedic International

I saw this movie via the Florida Film Festival; some people online gave glowing reviews to it, so I decided to check it out… this despite the fact that in the past I’ve seen some of Miike’s work and thought he was at best overrated. It just wasn’t for me. I thought that his most (in)famous film, Ichi The Killer, just wasn’t good and way too confused for me. However, this movie, based on a 1963 movie of the same name, sounded more straightforward. I ended up being quite satisfied with this motion picture.

The plot is rather straight-forward, to say the least. Apparently based on a true story, it chronicles life in 1840’s Japan, where the Shogun system still exists. Complaints come in about a guy named Naritsugu (Inagaki), a Lord who may become even more powerful in the near future, which is a bad, bad thing as he’s just one nasty dude. Caligula is the best comparison I can come up with for evil people in history. You see and hear him do some sick stuff, I’ll put it that way (perfect for Miike, I suppose, but that’s about the extent of the director’s trademark nastiness). So, someone behind the scenes hires some samurais to take out Naritsugu. They recruit some more sword masters to form a total of twelve and come up with a plan to take out Naritsugu and his protection in a town. The twelve go to town and they stumble upon some wacky guy in the woods and he joins along, becoming the 13th dude. The first part of the movie is the team coming together, working on this big plan, and then builds the trap. The second half of the movie… wow. It’s pretty much one epic long action sequence, and it’s tremendous.

Overall, the movie is simple yet effective. The characters are black and white and you want to see the bad guy get punished for his evil ways. There’s definitely violence but it’s not like you see blood spraying out after each swipe of the blade. There’s blood, but it doesn’t spray out too often. Yet, all the action is quite satisfying. The wacky guy in the woods is nice as it adds comic relief to the ultra-serious samurai and all the drama taking place.

Even though there were some uncomfortable moments when you saw Naritsugu on his reign of terror and some odd ones too, I overall rate this movie rather highly. If you dig the genre, this is a must-see, as a matter of fact. It will deliver everything you want… and more. Some may say that the first half is “slow”, but that’s poppycock to me. It’s the team getting together and forming the plan, and I was never bored by it at all.

One of the odd moments I referenced is when you see a character get killed rather clearly, and yet minutes later you see him return, alive and none the worse for wear. I guess something got lost in translation there. But, I’ll presume he’s an Immortal from the Highlander universe. Good thing he didn’t get his head chopped off.

I’ll be back Sunday night, and after that, Monday night. I’ll be seeing two more movies at the Florida Film Festival, and what a pair of contrasting films they will be.

Let Me In

Let Me In (2010)

90% on Rotten Tomatoes (out of 201 reviews)

Runtime: 115 minutes

Directed by: Matt Reeves

Starring: Chloe Moritz, Kodi Smit-McPhee, Richard Jenkins, Elias Koteas

From: Overture/Hammer (a new revival of that classic name)

Here’s a movie that I wanted to see on the big screen but I never got the chance to. In hindsight, that was a poor decision on my part. I mean, I saw the original movie, Let The Right One In, on the big screen back in late 2008 and that’s a pretty tremendous film. I mean, I rate it very highly and it’s something I can watch on DVD many times, which is not a common thing for me. I heard mixed things about this film and how it compares to the original. It’s an awfully tough task to even be on the same level as the original, but…

For the most part, it’s the exact same movie as the original. You have the snowy setting, most of the same characters (but with different names), the same general plot, and so on and so forth. The main difference is that some of the minor characters got dropped so that more of a focus was put on Owen (Oskar in the original) and this time the aspect of him going through puberty is brought in. And yeah, it’s set in New Mexico instead of Sweden. I’m not quite sure why they chose that particular state, but then again here, the setting isn’t as big of a factor as Sweden was in LTROI. Otherwise, except for minor things like that or the fact that the policeman researching the case is more of a factor here, the movie is almost identical. Whether or not you think that’s a bad thing is up to you. I mean, I’m not quite sure myself if that’s good or bad.

I do say that you should see the movie whether or not you see the original. I’d say that the Swedish version is the better flick, but this remake is far better than what I expected. It wasn’t “dumbed down” for American audiences (at least not too much; that’s probably why it didn’t do so well at the box office; I could have done without the frequent reminders that the movie is set in the early 80’s, with the standard selection of songs that for the most part you can hear on XM/Sirius’s 80’s station. I’ll never look at Burnin’ For You the same way again after the way it was used in this movie and a big car crash sequence), the performances are at least good, the atmosphere is nice, the music score-when it isn’t bombastic-works for the film. It’s just that the Swedish movie is so great, it’s an awful task to try and match it.

On its own, the movie is well worth seeing and again, I dun goofed by not watching it in a movie theatre. Bad bad Blair. If you want to see a serious vampire film that’s actually mainly about love and growing up and is the complete polar opposite of that God-awful Twilight crap, check this out.

I'll be back Wednesday night, where I'll review something a little different.

Oh, And...

I didn't mention it in the last thing I posted, but I'll be posting a new review tomorrow night.

It won't be of a Sidney Lumet film (RIP), but soon I will review one of his movies.

Movies and Cable Strangeness, Oh My

Before I mention what was on those old as dirt VHS tapes that I talked about recently, here are some real brief comments on a pair of movies I saw recently via them appearing on TCM Underground.

I didn't see all of it, but I watched Ghoulies, a ridiculously cheesy 80's film from low-budget master Charles Band. It's just not a good film. But, it did produce a scene I saw which left me in disbelief: a dorky and strange white guy breakdanced!

Yes, it's true.

And yeah, the brunette is actually a young Mariska Hargitay, in a role I'm sure she doesn't brag about. But wow, that scene will never fail to make me laugh.

The second movie is The Boogens, which I had heard good things about. Well, if it wasn't for characters that were really grating and annoying, then maybe I would have enjoyed it; but alas... the creatures were like rabid turtles, believe it or not.

Now, to copy and paste from elsewhere... the first tape had on it Sharky's Machine, then Thief, then Ordinary People.

After the credits for Sharky's Machine ended but before Thief began, there was a brief promo for something called "The Shogun Warriors: Gaiking", and it was ID'ed as "Animated Space Thriller", and I had no clue what in the shit it was. Turns out, it sounds like some old anime with giant robots; think Transformers or Power Rangers.

After Thief ended, there was the final 2 or so minutes of some celebrity interview show. Mark Hamill was the guest on there. After that, it was stated that coming up was Ordinary People, then something called Aerobicise. I was flummoxed as to why Showtime would be showing some exercise show.

Well, was I in for a shock.

I fast-forwarded to the end of Ordinary People, as I figured there would be a few minutes left on the tape before it ended. I was correct, and much to my surprise, I found out what Aerobicise was.

Basically, it was a few "exercises" in a half-hour block, and they even had a long warning in the beginning about being careful with doing these exercises, but it was obviously a soft-core sort of thing!

I managed to find one of the two segments that I saw before the tape ended.

But I am pissed I can't find the second segment I watched. THAT is totally WTF worthy. It's a "cooldown" with a guy and girl. Both are wearing the same unitard! It starts out and you can't make out what it is yet, but once you do, it looks as if the girl is giving the guy a BJ as they're spread-legged facing each other. She gets up, and they do some sort of synchronized routine. You then see that the guy looks almost exactly like Kenny Loggins... if he wore eye-liner. It's so preposterous, I can't believe it's not online, like many clips of Aerobicise are.

It turns out that one of those clips appeared in the 4th Friday the 13th movie; it was watched by that sleazy doctor Axel, remember.

The second tape had The Deer Hunter then Excalibur on it, and the third the strange trio of Bonnie & Clyde, Peggy Sue Got Married, then Ishtar.

The second tape had Deer Hunter and Excalibur. Before the Cimino film, there was an ad for the various shows that Showtime had on as original programming. Holy Christ, they looked SO low-rent and rinky-dink, as if it was public-access quality. Dexter and Californication, they are not; it's not even the same stratosphere. I do have to note that one show was entitled THE SHAFT OF LOVE, and it didn't look to be an adults-only program. In fact, it's a soap opera spoof, of all things.

After the first movie, there was free time before the second. I saw ads for the likes of Student Bodies, Shogun Assassin, and greatest of all, The Burning.

I saw some clips of Excalibur, and "what a wacky-looking movie" was my main impression, but one of these days I will watch it.

After that, there's quite a bit of free time; for some reason, that VHS tape was more like 7 hours on SLP rather than 6. So anyhow, they actually showed a music video, and much to my amusement, it's Donald Fagen (the lead singer of Steely Dan) and New Frontier. It's a Steely Dan-esque jazzy sort of tune about possible nuclear war. I'm not afraid to admit I like the song anyway, and I've seen the music video for it on YouTube before, but it was still an amusing thing to see. I had no idea they even showed music videos way back when.

After that, it was advertising some upcoming programs, including a RYAN O'NEAL DOUBLE FEATURE of Partners and So Fine. Partners looks like a comedy version of Cruising!

After that, it cut out before returning to what I presume was parts of Quest of Fire, before the tape ended. I've never seen that either, but it just looks so damn strange. I did notice one moment where it sure looks like one of the native guys gets a hummer from a chick!

The third tape was even less eventful. Not too much was on it at all. I can say it was from late '88 and was taped off of Cinemax. The first movie was Bonnie & Clyde. After that it went almost immediately into Peggy Sue Got Married. While fast-forwarding, I discovered that even back 25 years ago, Nic Cage had some awful hair pieces. After that, I saw some cheesy ads and graphics. Not too interesting, although I also saw the end credits for some Cinemax TV show called Norman's Corner, and it meant having to see (and hear) a young Gilbert Gottfried. What a sight that was. I did laugh that they advertised that coming soon was the famous misfire known as Walker.

Before the last movie, Ishtar, started, they had a "behind the scenes" deal with Overboard, of all films. After the other famous misfire, the tape pretty much ended there. Disappointing.

So yeah, I should have bought all the tapes that guy was offering for only 20 bucks, as it would have meant seeing some 80's strangeness on the premium cable channels back in the coke-fueled 80's.

Sharky's Machine

Sharky’s Machine (1981)

Runtime: 122 minutes

Directed by: Burt Reynolds

Starring: Burt (but of course), Vittorio Gassman, Brian Keith, Bernie Casey, Rachel Ward

From: Warner Brothers/Orion

Here’s a movie that I’ve seen once before, but I managed to watch again recently, and in a rather strange way. The first time I saw it, it was a DVD rental from the local library, of all places. This time, I saw it on a VHS tape… almost as old as I am! Way back in ’08, I was at a flea market north of Leesburg. It was in order to see a wrestling show; I know, appropriate entertainment for a small flea market. Well, at one table I stumbled upon a bunch of old VHS tapes of stuff tabled off of premium cable. It just happened to mainly be stuff from the 80’s, meaning tapes almost as old as I am. I picked out 3 that featured films I mainly had not seen before. I was offered his entire collection for 20 bucks. I declined, as I had seen or already owned a good amount of those movies already. In hindsight, I F’ed up, but I’ll explain why in another post coming up in a few days.

So, it was finally a few days ago that I actually watched something from one of those tapes, and it was this film. The sound wasn’t the best, but the picture looked surprisingly good considering I believe it was taped sometime in ’83.

To sum it up, I understand this borrows a lot from the 40’s film Laura (which I haven’t seen) and this was Burt’s try at becoming Dirty Harry. It didn’t quite work out. Basically, it’s the story of the greatly named Tom Sharky, a cop in Atlanta- a town you get to see big sweeping shots of throughout the film-who has things go wrong in a drug bust, so he gets demoted to vice squad; he meets a wacky group of characters, including Charles Durning, who acts like SUCH a cartoon angry yelling asshole, it’s insulting to your intelligence. Anyhow, Sharky and some of his pals (they’re known as his Machine; I don’t know if it’s like baseball pitcher Brian Wilson and his Machine or not; if you don’t know what I’m referring to, it’s probably for the best) stumble upon a case that involves both a crime kingpin-Gassman, trying his best to look like old-school Sean Connery-and a candidate for Governor of the state (Earl Holliman). A high-class prostitute named Dominoe (Ward, looking rather attractive) is also part of the deal.

Overall, this movie COULD have been cool and a classic. But, it’s just too damn long. There are some time where it really drags. There’s odd moments of humor. There seems to be too much crammed into the story. And, like I said already Charles Durning had a character that was such a ridiculous caricature of an angry cantankerous cop. It’s a turn-off.

But, it’s not awful. There’s a big stunt fall at the end; sure, much of the actual stunt done wasn’t featured in the movie (instead it’s replaced by an obvious dummy). There’s such things as some Japanese people who are apparently ninjas, a scene set at the old Atlanta Braves ballpark, Fulton County Stadium –why, I don’t know-a jazzy score, fingers being cut off, and Henry Silva as a drug-abusing killer who loves to yell a lot. Yet, with all that it's still boring at times. Figures.

I'll be back Monday night with a discussion over some of the strange stuff I've found on those ancient VHS tapes.