Blow Out (1981)
Runtime: 108 minutes
Directed by: Brian De Palma
Starring: John Travolta, Nancy Allen, John Lithgow, Dennis Franz, Curt May
From: MGM
Here is something else I originally posted on Letterboxd before posting it here. The plot description from the IMDb, then the Letterboxd commentary.
"A movie sound recordist accidentally records the evidence that proves that a car accident was actually murder and consequently finds himself in danger." True. Travolta plays Jack Terry, a guy who provides the sound effects for films (in this case, crappy low-budget horror films but it's still a job) and he's out and about getting new sound for the current film he's working on, Coed Frenzy. You see a few minutes of it at the beginning and I wish I could see Coed Frenzy in full. Anyhow, the car accident happens and he saves a young lady in the car. Well, the governor of Pennsylvania was in the car and he believes it was a murder instead of an accident. He becomes more paranoid and on edge as he believes a giant conspiracy is trying to silence him and the young lady.
A time I enjoy twice throughout the year is when Criterion films are 50% off at Barnes & Noble. It is great for stockpiling things you enjoy or want to check out. As I am me, though, I have a problem of not watching what I actually purchase. As that sale is starting up again in a matter of days, I figured it made sense to start watching one or two of them before I get more. I've had a Blu of this movie for awhile as I heard quite a few recommendations for the film, and yet it wasn't until last night that I finally sat down to check it out. I now know I am a fool for waiting so long to check this out.
This awesome political conspiracy thriller about the Pennsylvania governor-likely to become the new President-dying under mysterious circumstances in a car accident and Jack Terry-sound effects man for low-budget films (I tell you, I'd love to see Coed Frenzy)-happening to be a witness and saving the young lady who was in the governor's car (Nancy Allen) and suddenly both are in danger... it's able to stand up to the classic 70's films in the same vein due to it's very interesting and mature story that has its share of twists and turns, layered and colorful characters, a great view of the Philadelphia of the era, the music, and most of all the stylish camerawork/cinematography De Palma and Vilmos Zsigmond.
I know that at the time some thought the camera stuff was actually too flashy; I think that's poppycock, as it works so well here and to me it wasn't a gimmick and it didn't overwhelm the story at all.
Also, I appreciated how subtle it was. Some things were seen but they weren't zoomed in on and later they were part of the story, which made me feel good that I noticed such things. It may very well be Travolta's best-ever performance. I heard from a film fan that during its filming, he experienced insomnia. That certainly impacted his performance, and not in a bad way. Again, why didn't I see this sooner?
As someone who does enjoy watching B-movies, I enjoyed seeing posters for such films as Without Warning, The Boogey Man and The Food of the Gods.
I'll return Tuesday night.
Saturday, June 28, 2014
Friday, June 27, 2014
The Gauntlet
The Gauntlet (1977)
Runtime: 109 minutes
Directed by: Clint Eastwood
Starring: Clint Eastwood, Sondra Locke, Pat Hingle, William Prince, Bill McKinney
From: Warner Brothers
This is a random watch I saw last night on Encore Action... although it made perfect sense to see this after the goofy film I watched last night, as both have similar plots and even share a few moments. Believe me, this is better than what I saw last night.
To steal the plot description from the IMDb: “A hard but mediocre cop is assigned to escort a prostitute into custody from Las Vegas to Phoenix, so that she can testify in a mob trial. But a lot of people are literally betting that they won't make it into town alive.” Yes, bets literally happen. It's not really explained in the movie, so you shouldn't worry about it. Now, what I said about it on Letterboxd, with some added info:
This is one of the films that Eastwood did with his then-girlfriend Sondra Locke, where Clint is a mediocre alcoholic cop who has to drive a prostitute prisoner named Gus from Las Vegas to Phoenix. Turns out, “Gus” is Augustana Mally, a woman, and what he was told was a “simple matter” was something huge, to the point that people are placing odds on if she'll make it there or not.
And I do realize if you examine the story real closely, there are holes... not as many holes as the house or vehicles that get hundreds of bullets in them, but holes nonetheless; that said, I didn't care while watching it as the movie's a lot of fun. It's cool to see Clint do a parody of his indestructible Dirty Harry character, there are plenty of funny moments and the biggest asset is is the chemistry that Eastwood and Locke have with each other. It's great, and Gus being one tough sassy lady was appealing to me too.
While it doesn't always make sense, I had a lot of fun with the film overall; it starts off fast with no time wasted and the two stars literally going through a gauntlet of challenges as they meet up with some colorful (and sometimes foul-mouthed) characters, Bill McKinney as a Constable being the main example, spouting off disgusting questions to Gus about her profession. Nice chemistry, a simple and breezy story, and entertaining setpieces with a ridiculous of gunplay and bullets flying about... I enjoyed the movie.
I'll return tomorrow night.
Runtime: 109 minutes
Directed by: Clint Eastwood
Starring: Clint Eastwood, Sondra Locke, Pat Hingle, William Prince, Bill McKinney
From: Warner Brothers
This is a random watch I saw last night on Encore Action... although it made perfect sense to see this after the goofy film I watched last night, as both have similar plots and even share a few moments. Believe me, this is better than what I saw last night.
To steal the plot description from the IMDb: “A hard but mediocre cop is assigned to escort a prostitute into custody from Las Vegas to Phoenix, so that she can testify in a mob trial. But a lot of people are literally betting that they won't make it into town alive.” Yes, bets literally happen. It's not really explained in the movie, so you shouldn't worry about it. Now, what I said about it on Letterboxd, with some added info:
This is one of the films that Eastwood did with his then-girlfriend Sondra Locke, where Clint is a mediocre alcoholic cop who has to drive a prostitute prisoner named Gus from Las Vegas to Phoenix. Turns out, “Gus” is Augustana Mally, a woman, and what he was told was a “simple matter” was something huge, to the point that people are placing odds on if she'll make it there or not.
And I do realize if you examine the story real closely, there are holes... not as many holes as the house or vehicles that get hundreds of bullets in them, but holes nonetheless; that said, I didn't care while watching it as the movie's a lot of fun. It's cool to see Clint do a parody of his indestructible Dirty Harry character, there are plenty of funny moments and the biggest asset is is the chemistry that Eastwood and Locke have with each other. It's great, and Gus being one tough sassy lady was appealing to me too.
While it doesn't always make sense, I had a lot of fun with the film overall; it starts off fast with no time wasted and the two stars literally going through a gauntlet of challenges as they meet up with some colorful (and sometimes foul-mouthed) characters, Bill McKinney as a Constable being the main example, spouting off disgusting questions to Gus about her profession. Nice chemistry, a simple and breezy story, and entertaining setpieces with a ridiculous of gunplay and bullets flying about... I enjoyed the movie.
I'll return tomorrow night.
Thursday, June 26, 2014
Prime Target
Prime Target (1991)
Runtime: 86 minutes
Directed by: David Heavener
Starring: David Heavener, Tony Curtis (!), Isaac Hayes, Robert Reed (yes, the dad on The Brady Bunch), Andrew Robinson
From: Hero Films
Here's another film I discovered due to Letterboxd. In this case, it was due to another function of the site, which is that you can note a film and have it in a list to remind you what to watch in the future. This one was on the list of another person I follow, and I hadn't heard of it. When I saw that this movie was made by late 80's-early 90's Z-grade filmmaker Heavener-had that cast and even Bull Hurley from Over the Top in a small role as a tough guy named POTSY, I was intrigued. When I found the movie (nevermind how) and watched the opening credits, I saw that Troma released it-although they didn't make it-and the star and co-director also did the soundtrack of mediocre country songs... but the opening credits song itself was different. It was a funky country rap song! It was crappy, but also great at the same time. After that I had to watch it all.
To steal the plot description from the IMDb: “John Bloodstone is a cop who is put on suspension after he uses a flamethrower to stop a group of hostage takers. Bloodstone's next assignment begins when his boss, Commissioner Garth, calls him in and introduces him to FBI agent Harrington, and Garth and Harrington assign Bloodstone to transport a mob informant named Marrietta Copella to a new location.” Needless to say things don't go as planned, Bloodstone and the hilariously named Copella don't get along, and the whole thing is rather standard and there aren't too many surprises along the way, although I wasn't expecting to hear Curtis-as Marietta-say such things as refer to a woman's breasts as “gazaybos” or state that another woman “was built like a pizza parlor”. He was a long way from Some Like it Hot and The Sweet Smell of Success.
Like I said it's a typical low-budget action film, one of many made in the time period and one of many that are nearly forgotten now. I say it's about average. It's not awful but there's no real need to see it, even with the cast, the hilarious opening credits song, and the opening with the flamethrower. I wish there would have been more over the top moments like that, but alas...
I'll return tomorrow night.
Runtime: 86 minutes
Directed by: David Heavener
Starring: David Heavener, Tony Curtis (!), Isaac Hayes, Robert Reed (yes, the dad on The Brady Bunch), Andrew Robinson
From: Hero Films
Here's another film I discovered due to Letterboxd. In this case, it was due to another function of the site, which is that you can note a film and have it in a list to remind you what to watch in the future. This one was on the list of another person I follow, and I hadn't heard of it. When I saw that this movie was made by late 80's-early 90's Z-grade filmmaker Heavener-had that cast and even Bull Hurley from Over the Top in a small role as a tough guy named POTSY, I was intrigued. When I found the movie (nevermind how) and watched the opening credits, I saw that Troma released it-although they didn't make it-and the star and co-director also did the soundtrack of mediocre country songs... but the opening credits song itself was different. It was a funky country rap song! It was crappy, but also great at the same time. After that I had to watch it all.
To steal the plot description from the IMDb: “John Bloodstone is a cop who is put on suspension after he uses a flamethrower to stop a group of hostage takers. Bloodstone's next assignment begins when his boss, Commissioner Garth, calls him in and introduces him to FBI agent Harrington, and Garth and Harrington assign Bloodstone to transport a mob informant named Marrietta Copella to a new location.” Needless to say things don't go as planned, Bloodstone and the hilariously named Copella don't get along, and the whole thing is rather standard and there aren't too many surprises along the way, although I wasn't expecting to hear Curtis-as Marietta-say such things as refer to a woman's breasts as “gazaybos” or state that another woman “was built like a pizza parlor”. He was a long way from Some Like it Hot and The Sweet Smell of Success.
Like I said it's a typical low-budget action film, one of many made in the time period and one of many that are nearly forgotten now. I say it's about average. It's not awful but there's no real need to see it, even with the cast, the hilarious opening credits song, and the opening with the flamethrower. I wish there would have been more over the top moments like that, but alas...
I'll return tomorrow night.
Wednesday, June 25, 2014
Teens In The Universe
Teens in the Universe (Otroki Vo Vselennoy) (1975)
Runtime: 80 minutes
Directed by: Richard Viktorov
Starring: Misha Yershov, Aleksandr Grigoryev, Vladimir Savin, Vladimir Basov Ml., Olga Bityukova
From: Gorky Film
Here's the sequel to the film I watched last night, the one I heard was like if Stanley Kubrick was Russian and made this while he was on a drug trip. I was intrigued so I watched both in the past two nights. What a way to start off the week!
To do the plot description myself: To summarize the ending of the first movie, the teenage cosmonauts by accident get to the planet Cassiopeia almost instantaneously; it doesn't take 27 years, although 27 years passes by on Earth. Believe it or not, the twin paradox is brought up and actually explained accurately. They arrive at the planet and find out it's populated by robots that almost look like humans, and are either all white or all black. Turns out, the robot aliens killed all but a few silver-skinned humanoid aliens, who had to escape to a spaceship; the original robots there, you see, purged them of all emotions and turned them into those robot-humans. The kids and the silver-skinned aliens team up to get rid of those damned robots.
What an surreal acidtrip this turned out to be. It was filmed rather well and there are some wacky tracking shots and whatnot. The music sounds like if 1975 Miles Davis ingested a lot of peyote. It's bizarre spacey jazz... or something like that. Then again, at other times it sounds like Sun Ra from the 60's or 70's; that's definitely spacey eccentric jazz if you've never heard it. The alien planet did look sparse, with some weird things hopping around you only see from far away and aren't explained. The indoor building on the planet is austere and ornate, with a lot of white all over the place. It's also an interesting story, as shown already when I stated its plot. It's interesting and mature, especially for an old kids movie. I am glad things weren't dumbed down, an unfortunate modern trend.
Overall, the film is certainly different and yet it works both as phantasmagorical journey and as an entertaining story.
To best show how strange this movie is, someone made a 6 minute video containing scenes from the film set to Kraftwerk's Robots, which is awesome as hey, it's Kraftwerk.
Also, as it may be hard to find, a copy of this movie is on YouTube with subtitles. At least it is at this moment. The subtitles aren't always in sync but alas... or so I've heard... Here's a link to it.
I'll return tomorrow night.
Runtime: 80 minutes
Directed by: Richard Viktorov
Starring: Misha Yershov, Aleksandr Grigoryev, Vladimir Savin, Vladimir Basov Ml., Olga Bityukova
From: Gorky Film
Here's the sequel to the film I watched last night, the one I heard was like if Stanley Kubrick was Russian and made this while he was on a drug trip. I was intrigued so I watched both in the past two nights. What a way to start off the week!
To do the plot description myself: To summarize the ending of the first movie, the teenage cosmonauts by accident get to the planet Cassiopeia almost instantaneously; it doesn't take 27 years, although 27 years passes by on Earth. Believe it or not, the twin paradox is brought up and actually explained accurately. They arrive at the planet and find out it's populated by robots that almost look like humans, and are either all white or all black. Turns out, the robot aliens killed all but a few silver-skinned humanoid aliens, who had to escape to a spaceship; the original robots there, you see, purged them of all emotions and turned them into those robot-humans. The kids and the silver-skinned aliens team up to get rid of those damned robots.
What an surreal acidtrip this turned out to be. It was filmed rather well and there are some wacky tracking shots and whatnot. The music sounds like if 1975 Miles Davis ingested a lot of peyote. It's bizarre spacey jazz... or something like that. Then again, at other times it sounds like Sun Ra from the 60's or 70's; that's definitely spacey eccentric jazz if you've never heard it. The alien planet did look sparse, with some weird things hopping around you only see from far away and aren't explained. The indoor building on the planet is austere and ornate, with a lot of white all over the place. It's also an interesting story, as shown already when I stated its plot. It's interesting and mature, especially for an old kids movie. I am glad things weren't dumbed down, an unfortunate modern trend.
Overall, the film is certainly different and yet it works both as phantasmagorical journey and as an entertaining story.
To best show how strange this movie is, someone made a 6 minute video containing scenes from the film set to Kraftwerk's Robots, which is awesome as hey, it's Kraftwerk.
Also, as it may be hard to find, a copy of this movie is on YouTube with subtitles. At least it is at this moment. The subtitles aren't always in sync but alas... or so I've heard... Here's a link to it.
I'll return tomorrow night.
Tuesday, June 24, 2014
Moscow-Cassiopeia
Moscow-Cassiopeia (Moskva-Kassiopeya) (1973)
Runtime: 80 minutes
Directed by: Richard Viktorov
Starring: Innokentiy Smoktunovskiy, Misha Yershov, Aleksandr Grigoryev, Vasiliy Merkurev, Lev Durov
From: Gorky Film
If you are wondering why I watched an extremely obscure (at least in the Western world) piece of Soviet cinema made for children, it's due to Letterboxd. Someone I follow-because they followed me-calling themselves Reelz liked a review to a movie called Teens in the Universe. I had no bloody idea what that was, so I looked at the review, done by a dude named theNomad. His opening comment: “Imagine Stanley Kubrick had done massive amounts of peyote, learned Russian and for shits and giggles decided to make a 2001/Clockwork Orange hybrid to scare the crap out of kids.” As Buford T. Justice would say, “That's an attention-getter”. I didn't read any further as I wanted nothing spoiled.
I looked online to see if I could find the movie; I then discovered that it was a sequel to this film, which I figured I should watch first. There is a version of this film on Archive.org, but it's Russian with no subtitles, so that was a slight problem... I went to my secret place for watching all sorts of real obscure stuff and I was able to find it with subtitles. It's also on Mubi; it only costs a few bucks per month to be a member.
To steal the plot description from (redacted) and cleaned up by me: “An alarming radio signal from intelligent creatures reaches the Earth from the depths of the Universe. The project suggested by the young inventor Vitya Sereda should enable a spaceship to reach the planet. However the flight will last 27 years; that's why the spaceships crew is being formed up of schoolchildren. Everything has been thoroughly thought out but a mischievous Fedya Lobanov sneaks on board...”
Note that the “alarming radio signal” sounds almost exactly like Herbie Hancock's Rain Dance, a song from the early 70's and deep in his funk jazz fusion days. It's rather trippy, if you haven't heard it before. The theme in the opening credits sounds like lounge music. I can't explain why. The tale is rather wacky. A magical figure is involved-I heard him described as if he was an early version of Q years before he appeared in the Star Trek universe-as the young inventor is a genius and he comes up with that method to travel to the source of the signal. There's also the subplot of romance and who wrote a mysterious note professing love of Vitya... because of course, even in a tale involving 13 and 14 year olds.
Overall, while I understand this is the more “normal” of the two films, it's still rather odd. There's another element that was made famous years later by Star Trek: The Next Generation. There's actually a de facto Holodeck, of all things. Sometimes you get to see the world through a fish eye lens, and I don't know why. The score can be rather quirky at times, there's actually two folk-sounding songs you randomly hear in montages, the special effects are low-fi but they're unlike what I've seen before and thus I was charmed by them. I did enjoy the movie for what it was. It was nice how they didn't insult anyone's intelligence just because it was made with kids in mind. I appreciate such things.
I'll return tomorrow afternoon with what I've heard will be a real odd psychedelic experience of a movie.
Runtime: 80 minutes
Directed by: Richard Viktorov
Starring: Innokentiy Smoktunovskiy, Misha Yershov, Aleksandr Grigoryev, Vasiliy Merkurev, Lev Durov
From: Gorky Film
If you are wondering why I watched an extremely obscure (at least in the Western world) piece of Soviet cinema made for children, it's due to Letterboxd. Someone I follow-because they followed me-calling themselves Reelz liked a review to a movie called Teens in the Universe. I had no bloody idea what that was, so I looked at the review, done by a dude named theNomad. His opening comment: “Imagine Stanley Kubrick had done massive amounts of peyote, learned Russian and for shits and giggles decided to make a 2001/Clockwork Orange hybrid to scare the crap out of kids.” As Buford T. Justice would say, “That's an attention-getter”. I didn't read any further as I wanted nothing spoiled.
I looked online to see if I could find the movie; I then discovered that it was a sequel to this film, which I figured I should watch first. There is a version of this film on Archive.org, but it's Russian with no subtitles, so that was a slight problem... I went to my secret place for watching all sorts of real obscure stuff and I was able to find it with subtitles. It's also on Mubi; it only costs a few bucks per month to be a member.
To steal the plot description from (redacted) and cleaned up by me: “An alarming radio signal from intelligent creatures reaches the Earth from the depths of the Universe. The project suggested by the young inventor Vitya Sereda should enable a spaceship to reach the planet. However the flight will last 27 years; that's why the spaceships crew is being formed up of schoolchildren. Everything has been thoroughly thought out but a mischievous Fedya Lobanov sneaks on board...”
Note that the “alarming radio signal” sounds almost exactly like Herbie Hancock's Rain Dance, a song from the early 70's and deep in his funk jazz fusion days. It's rather trippy, if you haven't heard it before. The theme in the opening credits sounds like lounge music. I can't explain why. The tale is rather wacky. A magical figure is involved-I heard him described as if he was an early version of Q years before he appeared in the Star Trek universe-as the young inventor is a genius and he comes up with that method to travel to the source of the signal. There's also the subplot of romance and who wrote a mysterious note professing love of Vitya... because of course, even in a tale involving 13 and 14 year olds.
Overall, while I understand this is the more “normal” of the two films, it's still rather odd. There's another element that was made famous years later by Star Trek: The Next Generation. There's actually a de facto Holodeck, of all things. Sometimes you get to see the world through a fish eye lens, and I don't know why. The score can be rather quirky at times, there's actually two folk-sounding songs you randomly hear in montages, the special effects are low-fi but they're unlike what I've seen before and thus I was charmed by them. I did enjoy the movie for what it was. It was nice how they didn't insult anyone's intelligence just because it was made with kids in mind. I appreciate such things.
I'll return tomorrow afternoon with what I've heard will be a real odd psychedelic experience of a movie.
Sunday, June 22, 2014
Cold In July
Cold in July (2014)
89% on Rotten Tomatoes (out of 76 reviews)
Runtime: 109 minutes
Directed by: Jim Mickle
Starring: Michael C. Hall, Sam Shepard, Don Johnson, Wyatt Russell
From: IFC Films
Here's another review I copied and pasted from Letterboxd. I saw this well-regarded film last night at The Enzian, the local arthouse/indy theatre for film fans that live around Orlando. I'll return Tuesday night.
I'll be honest here, it's almost the halfway point of the year and thinking of the movies that are viable candidates for my Top 10 of 2014 list, it's slim pickings. Some things disappointing didn't help but I know I should start seeing more things I figured have a likely chance of being on the list.
From this site and other places I've heard real strong things about this neo-noir film set in late 1980's Texas, where an average everyday man (Michael C. Hall) shoots a burglar-and feels regret for the act-and all the ramifications that happen from that one event. Of course I won't spoil anything but the story goes in directions I was not expecting at all, and several famous movies of the past were obvious inspirations. There is also Sam Shepard, current “it” guy Wyatt Russell (no relation... unfortunately; it would be amazing if I was actually related to Kurt Russell) and Don Johnson, who is the highlight of the film with the colorful character he portrays.
This story (based upon a novel by prolific author Joe R. Lansdale) is brought to the screen very well by director Jim Mickle, a director whose work I've heard of but shamefully haven't seen... but I would like to change that fact sometime in the future and see the horror films he did. The story is filmed well-there are some awesome scenes and moments-and what an incredible 80's synthesizer/electronic store. I heard comparisons between this and some real highly regarded films, such as Killer Joe or Blood Simple. I was thankful that it actually lived up to the high praise and can be stand on its own compared to such critical and film fan favorites; if you love those, check this out.
Note that I saw this last night, and at the local arthouse/indy joint in the Orlando area. Sad to say, even there you now experience the worst and rudest in audience behavior. I'll spare the ranting and raving and just say I am crestfallen things have regressed to that point. And to have that happen while trying to watch a movie I thought was great was the biggest bitch of it all. Sigh...
Anyhow, you should believe the hype you may have heard. This will be among the best films I see all year.
89% on Rotten Tomatoes (out of 76 reviews)
Runtime: 109 minutes
Directed by: Jim Mickle
Starring: Michael C. Hall, Sam Shepard, Don Johnson, Wyatt Russell
From: IFC Films
Here's another review I copied and pasted from Letterboxd. I saw this well-regarded film last night at The Enzian, the local arthouse/indy theatre for film fans that live around Orlando. I'll return Tuesday night.
I'll be honest here, it's almost the halfway point of the year and thinking of the movies that are viable candidates for my Top 10 of 2014 list, it's slim pickings. Some things disappointing didn't help but I know I should start seeing more things I figured have a likely chance of being on the list.
From this site and other places I've heard real strong things about this neo-noir film set in late 1980's Texas, where an average everyday man (Michael C. Hall) shoots a burglar-and feels regret for the act-and all the ramifications that happen from that one event. Of course I won't spoil anything but the story goes in directions I was not expecting at all, and several famous movies of the past were obvious inspirations. There is also Sam Shepard, current “it” guy Wyatt Russell (no relation... unfortunately; it would be amazing if I was actually related to Kurt Russell) and Don Johnson, who is the highlight of the film with the colorful character he portrays.
This story (based upon a novel by prolific author Joe R. Lansdale) is brought to the screen very well by director Jim Mickle, a director whose work I've heard of but shamefully haven't seen... but I would like to change that fact sometime in the future and see the horror films he did. The story is filmed well-there are some awesome scenes and moments-and what an incredible 80's synthesizer/electronic store. I heard comparisons between this and some real highly regarded films, such as Killer Joe or Blood Simple. I was thankful that it actually lived up to the high praise and can be stand on its own compared to such critical and film fan favorites; if you love those, check this out.
Note that I saw this last night, and at the local arthouse/indy joint in the Orlando area. Sad to say, even there you now experience the worst and rudest in audience behavior. I'll spare the ranting and raving and just say I am crestfallen things have regressed to that point. And to have that happen while trying to watch a movie I thought was great was the biggest bitch of it all. Sigh...
Anyhow, you should believe the hype you may have heard. This will be among the best films I see all year.
Friday, June 20, 2014
The Chinese Boxer
The Chinese Boxer (Long Hu Dou) (1970)
Runtime: 90 minutes
Directed by: Jimmy Wang Yu
Starring: Jimmy Wang Yu, Lo Lieh, Ping Wang, Hsiung Chao, Mien Fang
From: Shaw Brothers
Here's another review I'll copy and paste from Letterboxd. Finally I watched another Shaw Brothers Studio film. I explain the plot in the write-up I did for the site, as there's none on IMDb and the one on Letterboxd looks like it was written by someone who doesn't know English as their first language. I will return Sunday night.
It had been too long since I watched a movie on the El Rey Network and also too long since I had seen a Shaw Brothers joint; as they always show a pair of SB movies every Thursday night, I killed two birds with one stone by checking out this film, one I've heard is influential in kung fu history and also one that was a big assist to Jimmy Wang Yu's career, as he starred and directed this.
It's a simple yet effective tale (I do understand why some would feel underwhelmed, though) where “Japanese fighters” kill Yu's master and most of his fellow students and he decides to get revenge. I did hear beforehand The House of Blue Leaves sequence from Kill Bill was “inspired” by something in this film and there was both samurai and Spaghetti Western influences; this is all true.
The movie made it patently clear that the villains were despicable people; there's no shades of gray. Besides the killing they do (including innocent people on the street, not martial artists), they gamble, accuse people of cheating, and yeah, there's even a rape to up the ante. That's why I enjoyed it so much when the hero gets his revenge in a bloody way, and oh yeah this is quite a bloody and graphic film, with the claret flowing often, whether it's spurting out from swords and daggers or it coming out of mouths due to internal injuries.
There was also comedy-at least in my mind-of Yu's disguise you see for much of the second half; there are reasons why but he wears a surgical mask and what pretty much are large white oven mitts; I was not expecting to be reminded of Michael Jackson while watching this, but it's true. Overall, I enjoyed the film as something different from what I typically have seen while slowly going through the Shaw Brothers filmography.
Runtime: 90 minutes
Directed by: Jimmy Wang Yu
Starring: Jimmy Wang Yu, Lo Lieh, Ping Wang, Hsiung Chao, Mien Fang
From: Shaw Brothers
Here's another review I'll copy and paste from Letterboxd. Finally I watched another Shaw Brothers Studio film. I explain the plot in the write-up I did for the site, as there's none on IMDb and the one on Letterboxd looks like it was written by someone who doesn't know English as their first language. I will return Sunday night.
It had been too long since I watched a movie on the El Rey Network and also too long since I had seen a Shaw Brothers joint; as they always show a pair of SB movies every Thursday night, I killed two birds with one stone by checking out this film, one I've heard is influential in kung fu history and also one that was a big assist to Jimmy Wang Yu's career, as he starred and directed this.
It's a simple yet effective tale (I do understand why some would feel underwhelmed, though) where “Japanese fighters” kill Yu's master and most of his fellow students and he decides to get revenge. I did hear beforehand The House of Blue Leaves sequence from Kill Bill was “inspired” by something in this film and there was both samurai and Spaghetti Western influences; this is all true.
The movie made it patently clear that the villains were despicable people; there's no shades of gray. Besides the killing they do (including innocent people on the street, not martial artists), they gamble, accuse people of cheating, and yeah, there's even a rape to up the ante. That's why I enjoyed it so much when the hero gets his revenge in a bloody way, and oh yeah this is quite a bloody and graphic film, with the claret flowing often, whether it's spurting out from swords and daggers or it coming out of mouths due to internal injuries.
There was also comedy-at least in my mind-of Yu's disguise you see for much of the second half; there are reasons why but he wears a surgical mask and what pretty much are large white oven mitts; I was not expecting to be reminded of Michael Jackson while watching this, but it's true. Overall, I enjoyed the film as something different from what I typically have seen while slowly going through the Shaw Brothers filmography.
Tuesday, June 17, 2014
Perfect Stranger
Perfect Stranger (2007)
Runtime: 109 minutes
Directed by: James Foley
Starring: Halle Berry, Bruce Willis, Giovanni Ribisi, Richard Portnow, Gary Dourdan
From: Revolution Studios
Would you believe I've seen this crappy movie once before, and at a drive-in? I went to a sketchy drive-in in Tampa (not the best part of Tampa, by the way) and before I watched Grindhouse there-yes it was a great experience-I had a few selections as to what I could watch first and I randomly picked this one; trust me, the choices were slim pickings. I saw last night it was on cable so I figured I should watch it again. No, it has nothing to do with the old TV show Perfect Strangers (Larry nor Balki are anywhere to be seen) and you don't hear the Deep Purple song Perfect Strangers either.
To steal the plot description from the IMDb: “A journalist goes undercover to ferret out businessman Harrison Hill as her childhood friend's killer. Posing as one of his temps, she enters into a game of online cat-and-mouse.” There's more to it than that but that's the plot in essence. Other things include the stereotype of a corrupt conservative senator, spyware, and daiquri's.
At the time I thought the movie was pretty crappy, and after seeing it again, it's still a crappy film. In fact, it's actually worse than I remembered. It's supposed to be a “sexy thriller” but it's not sexy or really all that thrilling either. The story is about a young lady being murdered and you end up with a boring slog where Berry goes undercover in an ad agency office and the boss is a clearly there for only a paycheck Bruce Willis and Giovani Ribisi is a computer nerd/hacker type.
A big problem is that you don't like any of the characters at all; Halle Berry's character... I don't want to be misogynistic here, but she's a real rude and unlikable person and I'll leave it at that. It's an issue when she's the lead person and you're supposed to be rooting for her. Willis is just a blank slate as a sleazy guy who may have done some bad things. Ribisi is an ass more than anything else. That makes caring about the dull as dishwater story even more of an impossible task. Also, the characters act pretty stupid and make some mistakes that'll make you shake your head with embarrassment, or maybe with disgust.
You get some cybersex action and watching random people do it... not exciting or titillating. Nor is the romance stuff you see throughout. I guess they rather wanted to spend time on getting blatant advertisements from Reebok, Victoria's Secret and Heineken than coming up with a better story or better characters.
But what really ruins things is the resolution of the story. It's one of those movies that thought it HAD to have a twist ending, even if one was unnecessary. This one in particular is extremely nonsensical and it invalidates what you had spent watching for the past almost 2 hours; it's totally illogical. Plus, it adds an additional layer of unpleasantness to the whole affair. That is the reason why I rate this as low as I do; without the twist the rating would be bad, but that ending makes it even lower (I will only give it 1 star out of 5 on Letterboxd). To think that this director's work includes At Close Range, Glengarry Glen Ross, and now some episodes of House of Cards. At least this didn't kill his career forever.
I'll return Friday night.
Runtime: 109 minutes
Directed by: James Foley
Starring: Halle Berry, Bruce Willis, Giovanni Ribisi, Richard Portnow, Gary Dourdan
From: Revolution Studios
Would you believe I've seen this crappy movie once before, and at a drive-in? I went to a sketchy drive-in in Tampa (not the best part of Tampa, by the way) and before I watched Grindhouse there-yes it was a great experience-I had a few selections as to what I could watch first and I randomly picked this one; trust me, the choices were slim pickings. I saw last night it was on cable so I figured I should watch it again. No, it has nothing to do with the old TV show Perfect Strangers (Larry nor Balki are anywhere to be seen) and you don't hear the Deep Purple song Perfect Strangers either.
To steal the plot description from the IMDb: “A journalist goes undercover to ferret out businessman Harrison Hill as her childhood friend's killer. Posing as one of his temps, she enters into a game of online cat-and-mouse.” There's more to it than that but that's the plot in essence. Other things include the stereotype of a corrupt conservative senator, spyware, and daiquri's.
At the time I thought the movie was pretty crappy, and after seeing it again, it's still a crappy film. In fact, it's actually worse than I remembered. It's supposed to be a “sexy thriller” but it's not sexy or really all that thrilling either. The story is about a young lady being murdered and you end up with a boring slog where Berry goes undercover in an ad agency office and the boss is a clearly there for only a paycheck Bruce Willis and Giovani Ribisi is a computer nerd/hacker type.
A big problem is that you don't like any of the characters at all; Halle Berry's character... I don't want to be misogynistic here, but she's a real rude and unlikable person and I'll leave it at that. It's an issue when she's the lead person and you're supposed to be rooting for her. Willis is just a blank slate as a sleazy guy who may have done some bad things. Ribisi is an ass more than anything else. That makes caring about the dull as dishwater story even more of an impossible task. Also, the characters act pretty stupid and make some mistakes that'll make you shake your head with embarrassment, or maybe with disgust.
You get some cybersex action and watching random people do it... not exciting or titillating. Nor is the romance stuff you see throughout. I guess they rather wanted to spend time on getting blatant advertisements from Reebok, Victoria's Secret and Heineken than coming up with a better story or better characters.
But what really ruins things is the resolution of the story. It's one of those movies that thought it HAD to have a twist ending, even if one was unnecessary. This one in particular is extremely nonsensical and it invalidates what you had spent watching for the past almost 2 hours; it's totally illogical. Plus, it adds an additional layer of unpleasantness to the whole affair. That is the reason why I rate this as low as I do; without the twist the rating would be bad, but that ending makes it even lower (I will only give it 1 star out of 5 on Letterboxd). To think that this director's work includes At Close Range, Glengarry Glen Ross, and now some episodes of House of Cards. At least this didn't kill his career forever.
I'll return Friday night.
Monday, June 16, 2014
Stay Hungry
Stay Hungry (1976)
Runtime: 102 minutes
Directed by: Bob Rafelson
Starring: Jeff Bridges, Sally Field, Arnold Schwarzenegger, R.G. Armstrong, Robert Englund
From: MGM
Here's another review that's copied from my review on Letterboxd, with some info added.
I have known about Stay Hungry for awhile. When you see a clip online of Jeff Bridges going up to the second floor of a small gym then you see Roger E. Mosley and Robert Englund among a small crowd huddled around Arnold Schwarzenegger (who I later found out was named Joe Santo) working out... while wearing a costume that includes a mask as if he was Zorro and a cape... you'll never forget such a thing and you'll get the desire to see the movie in full. Finally, on MGM HD last night I was able to check this out.
This is definitely a 70's film; it's about a young rich asshat (Bridges) whose parents recently died and he has to convince the owner of a small gym in Birmingham, Alabama to sell to the shady company he works for so the place could be torn down, except he digs the quirky characters there, including a young lady (Sally Field).
Besides the actors I mentioned already, the film also has Joe Spinell (as Jabo), R.G. Armstrong (as Thor), Ed Begley, Jr., Joanna Cassidy, and Scatman Crothers. To me, that sort of cast catches my attention.
Overall, the movie's certainly leisurely paced and has a threadbare plot where scenes sometimes appear to be irrelevant to the plot, but overall I enjoyed it. There's wackiness throughout; it's not just Arnold dressing up in a costume. He also plays the fiddle with a backwoods country band! There's some tremendous 70's clothing, and other things I dare not spoil, except that I was quite surprised by a few moments as it really came out of nowhere. It certainly has a memorable final act filled with oddball bits and situations.
Perhaps this movie's most important contribution is showing that Arnold is more than just some heavily-accented bodybuilder dude and he could actually be a famous actor.
I'll return tomorrow night.
Runtime: 102 minutes
Directed by: Bob Rafelson
Starring: Jeff Bridges, Sally Field, Arnold Schwarzenegger, R.G. Armstrong, Robert Englund
From: MGM
Here's another review that's copied from my review on Letterboxd, with some info added.
I have known about Stay Hungry for awhile. When you see a clip online of Jeff Bridges going up to the second floor of a small gym then you see Roger E. Mosley and Robert Englund among a small crowd huddled around Arnold Schwarzenegger (who I later found out was named Joe Santo) working out... while wearing a costume that includes a mask as if he was Zorro and a cape... you'll never forget such a thing and you'll get the desire to see the movie in full. Finally, on MGM HD last night I was able to check this out.
This is definitely a 70's film; it's about a young rich asshat (Bridges) whose parents recently died and he has to convince the owner of a small gym in Birmingham, Alabama to sell to the shady company he works for so the place could be torn down, except he digs the quirky characters there, including a young lady (Sally Field).
Besides the actors I mentioned already, the film also has Joe Spinell (as Jabo), R.G. Armstrong (as Thor), Ed Begley, Jr., Joanna Cassidy, and Scatman Crothers. To me, that sort of cast catches my attention.
Overall, the movie's certainly leisurely paced and has a threadbare plot where scenes sometimes appear to be irrelevant to the plot, but overall I enjoyed it. There's wackiness throughout; it's not just Arnold dressing up in a costume. He also plays the fiddle with a backwoods country band! There's some tremendous 70's clothing, and other things I dare not spoil, except that I was quite surprised by a few moments as it really came out of nowhere. It certainly has a memorable final act filled with oddball bits and situations.
Perhaps this movie's most important contribution is showing that Arnold is more than just some heavily-accented bodybuilder dude and he could actually be a famous actor.
I'll return tomorrow night.
Thursday, June 12, 2014
The Wild Bunch
The Wild Bunch (1969)
Runtime: 145 minutes
Directed by: Sam Peckinpah
Starring: William Holden, Ernest Borgnine, Robert Ryan, Edmond O'Brien, Warren Oates
From: Warner Brothers/Seven Arts
Here is another review I've copied and pasted from when I talked about it on Letterboxd a little earlier. I will be back Monday night, although in the meantime I'll watch again something I already reviewed here, but it'll be something new when I talk about it on Letterboxd.
Of course I have seen The Wild Bunch before but the last viewing was a long while ago so I was happy to watch it late last night on Turner Classic Movies HD. I was also happy to watch a great film again and enjoy its engrossing story, visceral violence and its groundbreaking editing style which would change filmmaking forever.
Set in 1913-when the Old West was changing forever and entering the age of modernity-& the old outlaws were becoming obsolete, the tale is about a group of aging anti-heroes who look for one last score before moving on in an evolving world and hopefully getting to relax and leave their old lifestyle behind. After an early attempt goes awry (this happens at the beginning of the film and sets the tone almost immediately, from how everyone acts to the aforementioned way the action stuff is edited, which was revolutionary at the time. They then end up in Mexico and deal with a feud in a small town between a corrupt military and the town's poor citizens; this is mixed in with bounty hunters and the United States Army after them.
The movie is still great 45 years later, what with its colorful band of rogue characters, including the title group that don't always get along but they still live by their own code of ethics, memorable setpieces, a pretty sweet beginning and an incredible ending with the period of epic bloodletting in American cinema still in its infancy. This was drastically different from the typical sanitized American western that people had seen for the past few decades, so this created quite a stir but thankfully since then people have recognized its greatness.
Alongside the violence and the quality filmmaking that everyone remembers best from the film, the performances from the cast (especially William Holden as Pike Bishop, the leader of the gang and Ernest Borgnine as his right hand man Dutch Engstrom), the musical score that captures the flavor of each area they go to, and an always interesting story where all the men have to deal with various issues and serious conflict as they try to pull off that one last heist, which proves to be a difficult task.
As a random aside, after I watched this I realized that this was an obvious influence on the great game known as Red Dead Redemption, from the general idea of a veteran cowboy having to deal with a changing Old West that's become more civilized and modern (the game's set in 1911) to some similar weaponry, to other ideas.
Runtime: 145 minutes
Directed by: Sam Peckinpah
Starring: William Holden, Ernest Borgnine, Robert Ryan, Edmond O'Brien, Warren Oates
From: Warner Brothers/Seven Arts
Here is another review I've copied and pasted from when I talked about it on Letterboxd a little earlier. I will be back Monday night, although in the meantime I'll watch again something I already reviewed here, but it'll be something new when I talk about it on Letterboxd.
Of course I have seen The Wild Bunch before but the last viewing was a long while ago so I was happy to watch it late last night on Turner Classic Movies HD. I was also happy to watch a great film again and enjoy its engrossing story, visceral violence and its groundbreaking editing style which would change filmmaking forever.
Set in 1913-when the Old West was changing forever and entering the age of modernity-& the old outlaws were becoming obsolete, the tale is about a group of aging anti-heroes who look for one last score before moving on in an evolving world and hopefully getting to relax and leave their old lifestyle behind. After an early attempt goes awry (this happens at the beginning of the film and sets the tone almost immediately, from how everyone acts to the aforementioned way the action stuff is edited, which was revolutionary at the time. They then end up in Mexico and deal with a feud in a small town between a corrupt military and the town's poor citizens; this is mixed in with bounty hunters and the United States Army after them.
The movie is still great 45 years later, what with its colorful band of rogue characters, including the title group that don't always get along but they still live by their own code of ethics, memorable setpieces, a pretty sweet beginning and an incredible ending with the period of epic bloodletting in American cinema still in its infancy. This was drastically different from the typical sanitized American western that people had seen for the past few decades, so this created quite a stir but thankfully since then people have recognized its greatness.
Alongside the violence and the quality filmmaking that everyone remembers best from the film, the performances from the cast (especially William Holden as Pike Bishop, the leader of the gang and Ernest Borgnine as his right hand man Dutch Engstrom), the musical score that captures the flavor of each area they go to, and an always interesting story where all the men have to deal with various issues and serious conflict as they try to pull off that one last heist, which proves to be a difficult task.
As a random aside, after I watched this I realized that this was an obvious influence on the great game known as Red Dead Redemption, from the general idea of a veteran cowboy having to deal with a changing Old West that's become more civilized and modern (the game's set in 1911) to some similar weaponry, to other ideas.
Tuesday, June 10, 2014
Skyline
Skyline (2010)
Runtime: 94 minutes
Directed by: The Brothers Strause
Starring: Eric Balfour, Donald Faison, Scottie Thompson, Brittany Daniel, David Zayas
From: Rogue/Relativity Media
My apologies for this being up later than planned; I lost track of time while doing other things. With my schedule, I won't be back until Thursday night. Now, let me talk about an infamous film that has been noted as an exceptionally awful wide release motion picture of recent years, and yet it wasn't until Sunday night that I finally checked it out. After I give the IMDb plot description, what I wrote on Letterboxd about it:
“Jarrod and his pregnant girlfriend Elaine travel to Los Angeles to meet his old friend and successful entrepreneur Terry, and his wife Candice. Terry gives a party in his apartment for Jarrod and offers a job position to him in LA. Terry's assistant and lover Denise (Crystal Reed) and his friend Ray (Neil Hopkins) sleep on the couch in the living room, but in the dawn of the next morning, the group is awakened by mysterious beams of blue light. Ray stares at the light and is taken by the mysterious force. The group of friends try to escape from the alien invaders.”
You know, I had been watching too many good films as of late...
Ever since this came out almost 4 years ago, I had heard a near unanimous toxic buzz concerning the film; I have had it in my mind for a long while to check it out despite (or maybe because) of the terrible word of mouth, but last night was finally the night I watched what I figured would likely be an awful motion picture... although I did try to keep my mind open.
Turns out, most people were right and this is an especially putrid film. It was made by The Brothers Strause, special effects guys who were given the job of directing that AvP: Requiem movie... that was a stupid move on Fox to give guys with no experience such a job, but they weren't the ones who wrote it or decided the movie should literally be so dark it's hard to see (Fox, in their infantile wisdom decided on that, or so I've heard). With this film, they all did it themselves in terms of making it and providing the effects (heck, they even created their own cameras and those were used to film everything) and to me that was cool they were able to make something and have it released by a major studio.
That said, Skyline is rather atrocious. The story and how such a large alien invasion is shown on a very small scale and you mainly see only a few people in a fancy apartment or how the aliens themselves are real goofy and somehow have a light to draw people in to suck them up into their giant ships... it's silly but it's not a deal-breaker to me. However, how the story is plotted (a bunch of stuff happens randomly and the “heroes” come off as many things, including buffoons) and how pretty much all the characters are loathsome disgusting vapid pieces of garbage... yeah, that is a deal-breaker. Crappy action scenes you don't care about don't help either.
As for the special effects, sometimes they are cool and other times, they are pretty bad. It's an issue when the movie is full of CGI. They should have spent more time providing ANY sort of backstory to the characters but they don't, so you have no idea why the really rich dude is really rich, to list one of many examples. So, you just have a bunch of asstagonists (that's a term I use often to describe protagonists who act like A-holes and D-bags; it's unfortunate I have to use it often) who constantly argue and bicker with each other and you hate pretty much all of them and with the story being so bad and the ending being a giant middle finger... of course it's just recently that The Brothers Strause have promised a sequel to this, known as Beyond Skyline. Or rather, I think “threatened” is a better term than “promised”.
Overall, with the 10 million dollars they had they really should have done something different with it. An alien invasion-abduction sort of thing is SO cliché by now. Making something small-scale and not too ambitious or huge in scope would have been nice too. Instead, we got this.
Runtime: 94 minutes
Directed by: The Brothers Strause
Starring: Eric Balfour, Donald Faison, Scottie Thompson, Brittany Daniel, David Zayas
From: Rogue/Relativity Media
My apologies for this being up later than planned; I lost track of time while doing other things. With my schedule, I won't be back until Thursday night. Now, let me talk about an infamous film that has been noted as an exceptionally awful wide release motion picture of recent years, and yet it wasn't until Sunday night that I finally checked it out. After I give the IMDb plot description, what I wrote on Letterboxd about it:
“Jarrod and his pregnant girlfriend Elaine travel to Los Angeles to meet his old friend and successful entrepreneur Terry, and his wife Candice. Terry gives a party in his apartment for Jarrod and offers a job position to him in LA. Terry's assistant and lover Denise (Crystal Reed) and his friend Ray (Neil Hopkins) sleep on the couch in the living room, but in the dawn of the next morning, the group is awakened by mysterious beams of blue light. Ray stares at the light and is taken by the mysterious force. The group of friends try to escape from the alien invaders.”
You know, I had been watching too many good films as of late...
Ever since this came out almost 4 years ago, I had heard a near unanimous toxic buzz concerning the film; I have had it in my mind for a long while to check it out despite (or maybe because) of the terrible word of mouth, but last night was finally the night I watched what I figured would likely be an awful motion picture... although I did try to keep my mind open.
Turns out, most people were right and this is an especially putrid film. It was made by The Brothers Strause, special effects guys who were given the job of directing that AvP: Requiem movie... that was a stupid move on Fox to give guys with no experience such a job, but they weren't the ones who wrote it or decided the movie should literally be so dark it's hard to see (Fox, in their infantile wisdom decided on that, or so I've heard). With this film, they all did it themselves in terms of making it and providing the effects (heck, they even created their own cameras and those were used to film everything) and to me that was cool they were able to make something and have it released by a major studio.
That said, Skyline is rather atrocious. The story and how such a large alien invasion is shown on a very small scale and you mainly see only a few people in a fancy apartment or how the aliens themselves are real goofy and somehow have a light to draw people in to suck them up into their giant ships... it's silly but it's not a deal-breaker to me. However, how the story is plotted (a bunch of stuff happens randomly and the “heroes” come off as many things, including buffoons) and how pretty much all the characters are loathsome disgusting vapid pieces of garbage... yeah, that is a deal-breaker. Crappy action scenes you don't care about don't help either.
As for the special effects, sometimes they are cool and other times, they are pretty bad. It's an issue when the movie is full of CGI. They should have spent more time providing ANY sort of backstory to the characters but they don't, so you have no idea why the really rich dude is really rich, to list one of many examples. So, you just have a bunch of asstagonists (that's a term I use often to describe protagonists who act like A-holes and D-bags; it's unfortunate I have to use it often) who constantly argue and bicker with each other and you hate pretty much all of them and with the story being so bad and the ending being a giant middle finger... of course it's just recently that The Brothers Strause have promised a sequel to this, known as Beyond Skyline. Or rather, I think “threatened” is a better term than “promised”.
Overall, with the 10 million dollars they had they really should have done something different with it. An alien invasion-abduction sort of thing is SO cliché by now. Making something small-scale and not too ambitious or huge in scope would have been nice too. Instead, we got this.
Sunday, June 8, 2014
A Quick Change
My plans changed for today and I won't get into it, but I had no time to watch anything up to now. However, I will have a review up for tomorrow night and it may be a colorful review.
Saturday, June 7, 2014
I Discuss John Milius
Here's something else I copied and pasted from Letterboxd. I recently finally got the Epix block of channels. That makes me happy, as they do show quite a few recent movies along with some interesting older ones. Plus, they have a standard definition only station known as Epix Drive-In, where they don't always show drive-in programming but it looks interesting nonetheless. Anyhow, I finally got to see the Epix exclusive documentary known as Milius, released last year and all about the famous writer/director of old John Milius. Now, what I said about the film in my 4 star review on Letterboxd:
Around these parts I doubt I need to do much elaboration of the career of John Milius, writer of such films as Dirty Harry, Magnum Force, Apocalypse Now and Conan the Barbarian and the guy who wrote the all-time classic U.S.S. Indianapolis speech for Jaws, and director of Conan and the infamous Red Dawn... also, he is close friends with Coppola, Lucas and Spielberg and they all influenced each other during their glory days. He's an unheralded guy in general so I was glad a documentary-more than 6 years in the making-was made which recapped his movie-making career.
The film recaps his life and demonstrated clearly how much of an iconoclast he was, especially when the Hollywood landscape changed and morphed to the corporate business it has become and he was unwilling to change; the movie is willing to show faults such as this. It offered up many entertaining tales concerning his wild over the top nature and how he idolized such figures as samurais and Teddy Roosevelt.
I shamefully knew too little about this important figure to cinema in the past 45 years and this documentary did a quality job in learning about the man and his contributions, and makes me sad that with what Hollywood has become we'll lose the participation of wild and passionate and spirited individuals such as him, people who are needed to add flavor and character to Hollywood cinema.
I'll return tomorrow night.
Around these parts I doubt I need to do much elaboration of the career of John Milius, writer of such films as Dirty Harry, Magnum Force, Apocalypse Now and Conan the Barbarian and the guy who wrote the all-time classic U.S.S. Indianapolis speech for Jaws, and director of Conan and the infamous Red Dawn... also, he is close friends with Coppola, Lucas and Spielberg and they all influenced each other during their glory days. He's an unheralded guy in general so I was glad a documentary-more than 6 years in the making-was made which recapped his movie-making career.
The film recaps his life and demonstrated clearly how much of an iconoclast he was, especially when the Hollywood landscape changed and morphed to the corporate business it has become and he was unwilling to change; the movie is willing to show faults such as this. It offered up many entertaining tales concerning his wild over the top nature and how he idolized such figures as samurais and Teddy Roosevelt.
I shamefully knew too little about this important figure to cinema in the past 45 years and this documentary did a quality job in learning about the man and his contributions, and makes me sad that with what Hollywood has become we'll lose the participation of wild and passionate and spirited individuals such as him, people who are needed to add flavor and character to Hollywood cinema.
I'll return tomorrow night.
Friday, June 6, 2014
I Discuss The First Two A Nightmare On Elm Street Films
A few days ago, I looked through the archives to see what I thought of those two movies... only I couldn't find those reviews at all. Either Google screwed up or I actually never did reviews of those movies. Odd either way. Recently I acquired all the Freddy Krueger films (no, I am not counting the remake, which I understand is real awful) as I got it in a pair of DVD sets for pretty cheap and it does the job for me even if it isn't the recent box set.
I'll be copying and pasting my Letterboxd reviews for the first two; the first one is recent as I just posted it yesterday.
A Nightmare On Elm Street
This is another review where I had previously done one but then I decided to delete it and do it all over again after seeing the film another time recently. In this case I am actually bumping my rating up a little from where I had it originally.
The more I see the film the more I seem to appreciate it. The fact that the origin of the film was based on real life (Sudden Unexplained Death Syndrome is a phenomenon that seems to only affect Southeast Asians; director Craven read some articles in the late 70's in Los Angeles newspapers where several cases of SUDS happened and the victims had horrible nightmares before passing away out of nowhere, and it was a morbid but natural inspiration for a horror film) makes it creepy, but at this time Fred Krueger was still a very creepy and terrifying villain, a killer of children and implied child molester. Them getting Robert Englund for the role was tremendous casting as he brought Freddy Krueger to life.
Besides a great general idea of a villain that everyone could identify with-everyone has nightmares, after all-the story is done real well. The stuff with the lead heroine and her parents was especially nice and added depth to the tale. There are many scenes and moments from the film that plenty of horror fans still remember today (including me)... from the effect of Freddy's frame coming through the wall to the deaths of two key characters, Freddy's outstretched arms to the wacky ending, those are unforgettable moments for genre devotees.
As I learned more about how the film was made and how they were able to do the practical effects (still great today and stand the test of time, unlike most CGI you see), I appreciate how they were able to pull it off. Overall, aside from some goofy moments I do think it's a quality horror film with a great villain, interesting characters and nice interaction with those characters, awesome setpieces and a nice score, along with a great atmosphere where you often aren't sure what's real and what will turn out to be a surreal unsettling dream... I now realize that 4 out of 5 stars is a fitting rating for this motion picture.
A Nightmare On Elm Street 2: Freddy's Revenge
This is a tough one to rate. I might as well go with 3 stars as besides it being a goofy horror film that stands out as being different from the rest of the series with the possession angle (and whether or not the obvious homosexual angle is an attack on a teenage boy wrestling with his gay feelings or it's presenting it matter of fact and neutral, or it's something else dealing with homosexuality... I am not quite sure), you can both laugh at all the homoeroticism-it makes the movie play quite different if you view it normally then you see it with that perspective-and enjoy it as a horror film as Freddy Krueger was still a menacing villain instead of a wisecracking buffoon and there are some real creepy moments... some really weird ones, too.
The rating is due in part to entertainment value, and no matter how you look at it, it is entertaining.
I'll return tomorrow night.
I'll be copying and pasting my Letterboxd reviews for the first two; the first one is recent as I just posted it yesterday.
A Nightmare On Elm Street
This is another review where I had previously done one but then I decided to delete it and do it all over again after seeing the film another time recently. In this case I am actually bumping my rating up a little from where I had it originally.
The more I see the film the more I seem to appreciate it. The fact that the origin of the film was based on real life (Sudden Unexplained Death Syndrome is a phenomenon that seems to only affect Southeast Asians; director Craven read some articles in the late 70's in Los Angeles newspapers where several cases of SUDS happened and the victims had horrible nightmares before passing away out of nowhere, and it was a morbid but natural inspiration for a horror film) makes it creepy, but at this time Fred Krueger was still a very creepy and terrifying villain, a killer of children and implied child molester. Them getting Robert Englund for the role was tremendous casting as he brought Freddy Krueger to life.
Besides a great general idea of a villain that everyone could identify with-everyone has nightmares, after all-the story is done real well. The stuff with the lead heroine and her parents was especially nice and added depth to the tale. There are many scenes and moments from the film that plenty of horror fans still remember today (including me)... from the effect of Freddy's frame coming through the wall to the deaths of two key characters, Freddy's outstretched arms to the wacky ending, those are unforgettable moments for genre devotees.
As I learned more about how the film was made and how they were able to do the practical effects (still great today and stand the test of time, unlike most CGI you see), I appreciate how they were able to pull it off. Overall, aside from some goofy moments I do think it's a quality horror film with a great villain, interesting characters and nice interaction with those characters, awesome setpieces and a nice score, along with a great atmosphere where you often aren't sure what's real and what will turn out to be a surreal unsettling dream... I now realize that 4 out of 5 stars is a fitting rating for this motion picture.
A Nightmare On Elm Street 2: Freddy's Revenge
This is a tough one to rate. I might as well go with 3 stars as besides it being a goofy horror film that stands out as being different from the rest of the series with the possession angle (and whether or not the obvious homosexual angle is an attack on a teenage boy wrestling with his gay feelings or it's presenting it matter of fact and neutral, or it's something else dealing with homosexuality... I am not quite sure), you can both laugh at all the homoeroticism-it makes the movie play quite different if you view it normally then you see it with that perspective-and enjoy it as a horror film as Freddy Krueger was still a menacing villain instead of a wisecracking buffoon and there are some real creepy moments... some really weird ones, too.
The rating is due in part to entertainment value, and no matter how you look at it, it is entertaining.
I'll return tomorrow night.
Wednesday, June 4, 2014
Sabotage (the 1936 film)
Sabotage (1936)
Runtime: 76 minutes
Directed by: Alfred Hitchcock
Starring: Sylvia Sidney, Oskar Homolka, Desmond Tester, John Loder
From: Gaumont British Picture Corporation
Listen all of y'all, this is a review to the 1936 film Sabotage from Hitchcock (like the one I reviewed last night, A Lady Vanishes, back in his old British days); I am not reviewing again that awful Arnie movie which came out earlier this year with the same title. The review I did then makes it clear I'd rather not watch it ever again. Before anyone asks, no one in this movie is like Buddy Rich when they fly off the handle... OK, I'll stop with the reference to the Beastie Boys song, but the Buddy Rich “bus tapes” are pretty darn funny due to how deranged and how much of an A-hole he was when he was angry.
To steal the plot description from the IMDb: “Mr. Verloc is part of a gang of foreign saboteurs operating out of London. He manages a small cinema with his wife and her teenage brother as a cover, but they know nothing of his secret. Scotland Yard assign an undercover detective to work at the shop next to the cinema in order to observe the gang.” By the way, it's revealed almost right away that Mr. Verloc is one of the bad guys so that's not a spoiler; it's not a mystery as to whether he's engaging in the title act or not; rather it's suspenseful as the detective is investigating him without trying to get found out.
Overall, I am sure I'd rate the movie as about 3 stars on Letterboxd; for many directors they'd enjoy having a movie rated in such a way. With Hitchcock, though... that means it's pretty much a minor work for him. For me that's alright as that was before he got into Hollywood and he went on an amazing run where most of his work was from very good to great; here he was still honing his craft and paying his dues and getting experience before making it in America.
The movie was interesting, it had some real nice moments and a cool ending. Yet, despite that and a short running time, it overall is “only” a 3 star movie. It's a nice watch but in no way is it anything like the genius of Psycho, Rear Window, North by Northwest or Strangers on a Train. As long as you know that going in... you'll enjoy it and not feel let down.
I'll return Friday night.
Runtime: 76 minutes
Directed by: Alfred Hitchcock
Starring: Sylvia Sidney, Oskar Homolka, Desmond Tester, John Loder
From: Gaumont British Picture Corporation
Listen all of y'all, this is a review to the 1936 film Sabotage from Hitchcock (like the one I reviewed last night, A Lady Vanishes, back in his old British days); I am not reviewing again that awful Arnie movie which came out earlier this year with the same title. The review I did then makes it clear I'd rather not watch it ever again. Before anyone asks, no one in this movie is like Buddy Rich when they fly off the handle... OK, I'll stop with the reference to the Beastie Boys song, but the Buddy Rich “bus tapes” are pretty darn funny due to how deranged and how much of an A-hole he was when he was angry.
To steal the plot description from the IMDb: “Mr. Verloc is part of a gang of foreign saboteurs operating out of London. He manages a small cinema with his wife and her teenage brother as a cover, but they know nothing of his secret. Scotland Yard assign an undercover detective to work at the shop next to the cinema in order to observe the gang.” By the way, it's revealed almost right away that Mr. Verloc is one of the bad guys so that's not a spoiler; it's not a mystery as to whether he's engaging in the title act or not; rather it's suspenseful as the detective is investigating him without trying to get found out.
Overall, I am sure I'd rate the movie as about 3 stars on Letterboxd; for many directors they'd enjoy having a movie rated in such a way. With Hitchcock, though... that means it's pretty much a minor work for him. For me that's alright as that was before he got into Hollywood and he went on an amazing run where most of his work was from very good to great; here he was still honing his craft and paying his dues and getting experience before making it in America.
The movie was interesting, it had some real nice moments and a cool ending. Yet, despite that and a short running time, it overall is “only” a 3 star movie. It's a nice watch but in no way is it anything like the genius of Psycho, Rear Window, North by Northwest or Strangers on a Train. As long as you know that going in... you'll enjoy it and not feel let down.
I'll return Friday night.
Tuesday, June 3, 2014
The Lady Vanishes
The Lady Vanishes (1938)
Runtime: 96 minutes
Directed by: Finally, I see another movie from Hitchcock
Starring: Margaret Lockwood, Michael Redgrave, Paul Lukas, Dame May Whitty
From: Gainsborough Pictures
As of late I've mainly been watching really old movies. It just worked out that way, you know. I haven't reviewed any of his films in a real long while (I did do Strangers on a Train on Letterboxd in March, but that was a rewatch and I already reviewed that a few years prior) so I figured doing this would be killing 2 birds with 1 stone.
To steal a long plot description from the IMDb: “Passengers on a scheduled train out of the mountainous European country of Mandrika are delayed by a day due to an avalanche, and thus get up close and personal with each other out of necessity in the only and what becomes an overcrowded inn in the area. Once the train departs, the one person who it is uncertain is on the train is a middle aged English governess named Miss Froy. Iris Henderson, who was vacationing in Mandrika with girlfriends before heading back to England to get married, is certain that Miss Froy was on the train as they were in the same compartment and they had tea together in the dining car, but all those people who can corroborate her story don't seem to want to do so. Iris' thoughts are easily dismissed as a possible concussion as Iris was hit over the head just before boarding the train...” Yep, it's a now familiar plot device used in such subsequent movies as Bunny Lake Is Missing and Flightplan.
The rest of the review is from Letterboxd, where I rated it 3 ½ stars out of 5, with some additional information.
Overall, I'd say that I enjoyed it enough to give it a 3 ½ star rating, but in the world of Hitchcock motion pictures, it means that there definitely are other works of his I'd see again rather than this. Sure, the three main characters you see-and I listed first when I mention the movie's stars-all do a real nice job, there are some quality laughs and thrilling moments too.
Yet, the movie takes awhile before the train gets-a-rollin'; it establishes characters and all that and I have no complaint with that; not all of the humor works, unfortunately. That and some pretty dumb/annoying characters were disappointing; maybe they were funny/entertaining at the time... for example, sometime I enjoyed the British chaps who were obsessed with cricket (allegedly, that represented those Brits who focused on other things rather than the impending World War, or so I hear) and othertimes they just came off as obnoxious dopes.
Then, the story ends up being real absurd and ridiculous and even nonsensical at a few moments. While I was amused at the directions the tale went, it also was kind of goofy, and it stood out with a story I did find often to be quite interesting and intriguing. But that's OK. While others may enjoy this more than me, at least I have more than a few films from Hitch I can rewatch with more enjoyment than what'd happened if I saw this again without the aid of a mute button or the fast forward button.
I'll return tomorrow night.
Runtime: 96 minutes
Directed by: Finally, I see another movie from Hitchcock
Starring: Margaret Lockwood, Michael Redgrave, Paul Lukas, Dame May Whitty
From: Gainsborough Pictures
As of late I've mainly been watching really old movies. It just worked out that way, you know. I haven't reviewed any of his films in a real long while (I did do Strangers on a Train on Letterboxd in March, but that was a rewatch and I already reviewed that a few years prior) so I figured doing this would be killing 2 birds with 1 stone.
To steal a long plot description from the IMDb: “Passengers on a scheduled train out of the mountainous European country of Mandrika are delayed by a day due to an avalanche, and thus get up close and personal with each other out of necessity in the only and what becomes an overcrowded inn in the area. Once the train departs, the one person who it is uncertain is on the train is a middle aged English governess named Miss Froy. Iris Henderson, who was vacationing in Mandrika with girlfriends before heading back to England to get married, is certain that Miss Froy was on the train as they were in the same compartment and they had tea together in the dining car, but all those people who can corroborate her story don't seem to want to do so. Iris' thoughts are easily dismissed as a possible concussion as Iris was hit over the head just before boarding the train...” Yep, it's a now familiar plot device used in such subsequent movies as Bunny Lake Is Missing and Flightplan.
The rest of the review is from Letterboxd, where I rated it 3 ½ stars out of 5, with some additional information.
Overall, I'd say that I enjoyed it enough to give it a 3 ½ star rating, but in the world of Hitchcock motion pictures, it means that there definitely are other works of his I'd see again rather than this. Sure, the three main characters you see-and I listed first when I mention the movie's stars-all do a real nice job, there are some quality laughs and thrilling moments too.
Yet, the movie takes awhile before the train gets-a-rollin'; it establishes characters and all that and I have no complaint with that; not all of the humor works, unfortunately. That and some pretty dumb/annoying characters were disappointing; maybe they were funny/entertaining at the time... for example, sometime I enjoyed the British chaps who were obsessed with cricket (allegedly, that represented those Brits who focused on other things rather than the impending World War, or so I hear) and othertimes they just came off as obnoxious dopes.
Then, the story ends up being real absurd and ridiculous and even nonsensical at a few moments. While I was amused at the directions the tale went, it also was kind of goofy, and it stood out with a story I did find often to be quite interesting and intriguing. But that's OK. While others may enjoy this more than me, at least I have more than a few films from Hitch I can rewatch with more enjoyment than what'd happened if I saw this again without the aid of a mute button or the fast forward button.
I'll return tomorrow night.
Monday, June 2, 2014
MovieStop Is Still A Great Place
That is what I did tonight instead of watch a movie. I went to a MovieStop I had only been to once before. I went there to look for a documentary and a box set; I didn't find the documentary but I did get the films I wanted in two DVD 4-packs instead of the box set (I at least saved cash) and I got some other discs. So I'll definitely be set for awhile even if I don't watch anything online or anything on cable.
I will return tomorrow night with my customary movie review.
I will return tomorrow night with my customary movie review.
Sunday, June 1, 2014
Massacre Mafia Style
Massacre Mafia Style (a.k.a. The Executioner) (1978)
Runtime: 82 minutes
Directed by Duke Mitchell
Starring: Duke Mitchell, Vic Caesar, Lorenzo Dodo, Louis Zito
From: Spartan Films
Here's a movie I saw via TCM Underground late last night. This is best known under its alternate title of Massacre Mafia Style, where it got released by Grindhouse Releasing, a company co-founded by the late son of Sly Stallone, Sage Stallone. It has an infamous reputation and now I found out why that was the case. It has to be noted that Mitchell-this was really a passion project for him-was a lounge singer in the 50's and was buddies with Sinatra and at least a few other members of the Rat Pack, and even had a ripoff act of Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis with Sammy Petrillo.
To steal the plot description from Letterboxd: “Terror reigns when Mimi, the son of a deported Don, along with his associate Jolly Rizzo wage a bloody war for control of the West Coast underworld, battling hordes of hard-boiled mobsters and deadly black pimps on their rise to the top!” Oh, and the making of porno movies is also involved.
To make it clear, this movie is technically pretty crappy. It's low-budget nonsense. Yet, it's SO entertaining. To copy and paste something written by Jeremy Milks, some dude on Letterboxd I follow because he started following me:
"One of my favourite films. I've seen this three times now and it just gets better for me. Duke Mitchell is so sincere and charismatic, yet this movie plays on any level you want. It works as a (sorta) straight crime film. It works as a piece of exploitation. It works as a comedy.
The opening scene is a wild piece of cinema as Mitchell and his buddy just cut through an entire office building killing everyone, but find themselves getting emotional and gentle when they run into a kid in an elevator. The whole movie does this juxtaposition so well - pure exploitive violence and sleaze mixed with this sincere attempt to say something about Italians, Catholics and family. Duke also kisses everyone on the lips - his father, friends, women, men, children. He also sings the majority of the songs, directs and narrates the film. It's a hell of a performance overall.
And when Duke gets on a rant, it's epic. "When you go to sleep I want you to sleep with one eye open. 'Cause I'm gonna choke you. I'm gonna choke your mother, I'm gonna choke your father, I'm gonna choke your f*cking kids! You understand me? I'm gonna go to the f*cking phone book and look up your last name. Everyone who has your last name is gonna get choked too."
From what I understand, the wacky setpieces of the film are actual tales Duke heard from mobsters he talked to at his stage show. Now, the movie is pretty much goofy exploitation fare and it doesn't make a lot of sense. At least it's short. It's the sort of film where there's a lot of preaching about how Sicilian people are stereotyped as being all in the Mafia and are ruthless killers... alongside scenes where Sicilians are in the Mafia and they're ruthless killers. There's plenty of racism, too; as if I needed to see another film with that. As it's exploitation, you see plenty of boobs... I was fine with that.
That said, Mitchell and the other people involved with the production do try their very best to try and say something with this unique take on the mob genre. Their trying so hard does help, for sure.
I'll return tomorrow night.
Runtime: 82 minutes
Directed by Duke Mitchell
Starring: Duke Mitchell, Vic Caesar, Lorenzo Dodo, Louis Zito
From: Spartan Films
Here's a movie I saw via TCM Underground late last night. This is best known under its alternate title of Massacre Mafia Style, where it got released by Grindhouse Releasing, a company co-founded by the late son of Sly Stallone, Sage Stallone. It has an infamous reputation and now I found out why that was the case. It has to be noted that Mitchell-this was really a passion project for him-was a lounge singer in the 50's and was buddies with Sinatra and at least a few other members of the Rat Pack, and even had a ripoff act of Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis with Sammy Petrillo.
To steal the plot description from Letterboxd: “Terror reigns when Mimi, the son of a deported Don, along with his associate Jolly Rizzo wage a bloody war for control of the West Coast underworld, battling hordes of hard-boiled mobsters and deadly black pimps on their rise to the top!” Oh, and the making of porno movies is also involved.
To make it clear, this movie is technically pretty crappy. It's low-budget nonsense. Yet, it's SO entertaining. To copy and paste something written by Jeremy Milks, some dude on Letterboxd I follow because he started following me:
"One of my favourite films. I've seen this three times now and it just gets better for me. Duke Mitchell is so sincere and charismatic, yet this movie plays on any level you want. It works as a (sorta) straight crime film. It works as a piece of exploitation. It works as a comedy.
The opening scene is a wild piece of cinema as Mitchell and his buddy just cut through an entire office building killing everyone, but find themselves getting emotional and gentle when they run into a kid in an elevator. The whole movie does this juxtaposition so well - pure exploitive violence and sleaze mixed with this sincere attempt to say something about Italians, Catholics and family. Duke also kisses everyone on the lips - his father, friends, women, men, children. He also sings the majority of the songs, directs and narrates the film. It's a hell of a performance overall.
And when Duke gets on a rant, it's epic. "When you go to sleep I want you to sleep with one eye open. 'Cause I'm gonna choke you. I'm gonna choke your mother, I'm gonna choke your father, I'm gonna choke your f*cking kids! You understand me? I'm gonna go to the f*cking phone book and look up your last name. Everyone who has your last name is gonna get choked too."
From what I understand, the wacky setpieces of the film are actual tales Duke heard from mobsters he talked to at his stage show. Now, the movie is pretty much goofy exploitation fare and it doesn't make a lot of sense. At least it's short. It's the sort of film where there's a lot of preaching about how Sicilian people are stereotyped as being all in the Mafia and are ruthless killers... alongside scenes where Sicilians are in the Mafia and they're ruthless killers. There's plenty of racism, too; as if I needed to see another film with that. As it's exploitation, you see plenty of boobs... I was fine with that.
That said, Mitchell and the other people involved with the production do try their very best to try and say something with this unique take on the mob genre. Their trying so hard does help, for sure.
I'll return tomorrow night.
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