Review – Cinderella Man

The tale of boxing legend Jim Braddock is one of those stories that just sort of tells itself. And that’s a good thing, because none of our storytellers here is exacting having his or her finest moment. Director Ron Howard probably has the lion’s share of the blame coming. He seems to be trying to create a blend of 21st century big budget Hollywood and sappy Frank Capra triumph-of-the-underdog, and more often than not it doesn’t work. It’s just hard to get behind a gazillion-dollar production about people so poor they can’t pay for utilities or food. However, this still turns out to be a reasonably entertaining movie. You’ll have to be in the mood for one of these sappy things about a washed-up athlete who makes an astounding comeback, but if that itch takes you then this is a solid way to scratch it. Mildly amusing

Review – Riding the Bullet

The DVD menus were scarier and more interesting than the movie. Honestly, this was a textbook example of how not to make a horror movie. Somewhere between the clichés and the umpteenth time the protagonist appears to die, this movie loses whatever chance it might have had to be entertaining. I know some real stinkers have been made from Stephen King stories over the years, but this one’s down among the worst. Honestly, the closest this whole disc comes to entertainment value is the weird montage of Bernie Wrightson’s sketches in the special features. Wish I’d skipped it

Review – Moonraker

This Bond episode is too desperately a reaction to the Star Wars craze of the late 70s, and a belated one at that. Despite a promising start, by this point the Moore Bonds had degenerated into the silly, gadget-happy farces for which he became known. The story’s not bad: a megalomaniacal millionaire decides the human race needs a little housecleaning, so he concocts a plot to exterminate everyone on the planet but leave the plants and animals intact so his cadre of hand-picked supermen (and women) can return to Earth from a hide-out in outer space and basically start humanity over from scratch. Naturally everyone’s favorite  agent uncovers the plot and manages to foil it via the usual series of chases, gun battles and sexual encounters. The result is a solid mid-packer in the series, not the best Bond by a long shot but nowhere near as bad as some of the worst. Mildly amusing

Review – Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle

Stoners everywhere rejoice! The 21st century still has a place for you. Seriously, I’ll bet this is a terrific movie if you’re so high you can’t focus for more than two or three minutes at a time, because the whole story here is a series of odd little situations of short duration and little or no connection to one another. As straight-laced Harold and his happy-go-lucky roommate Kumar go in search of the title restaurant to satisfy a case of the munchies, they do just about everything from performing emergency surgery to riding a cheetah through the woods. For those of us who haven’t smoked anything stronger than a cigarette for awhile, there isn’t that much to this. Some of the bits are funny, but for the most part this is just silly and meandering fluff. Mildly amusing

Review – King Kong (2005)

I wish I had a big-ass review for this big-ass movie. Unfortunately, all I have to say about it is rather brief. The effects were impressive, especially the re-creation of 1930s New York. The acting was good for the most part. It’s an entertaining show. The only thing that struck me as genuinely bad was the editing. In a three-hour-long movie it’s profoundly disappointing to find gaps in the plot, particularly when the immense run time included so many scenes that were either completely superfluous or more drawn-out than necessary. The result is something considerably better than the DeLaurentiis version but still not as good as the original. Mildly amusing

Review – In Good Company

It’s sad when a production has no greater aspiration than to be a romantic comedy and yet can’t even jump that relatively low hurdle. The set-up is here: fifty-something salesman copes with new baby on the way while his new, much younger boss secretly dates his eldest daughter (and yes, it’s legal, however marginally). If they’d just stuck with that, they might have come out okay. But then the subplot about corporate downsizing and the developing buddy relationship between old-timer and upstart overwhelm the entire picture, especially after the romance goes bad. The casting doesn’t help. Dennis Quaid has finally come to grips with the loss of his boyish charm, but that doesn’t leave him with much beyond a sad sort of Harrison-Ford-wannabe approach to roles. Scarlett Johansson does an okay job as the love interest, though her hair, makeup and wardrobe changes put her through an ageing and de-ageing ping pong match that was unsettling in places. And Topher Grace just needs to stick to TV sitcoms. Overall this movie falls flat because it doesn’t follow the formula well enough to succeed as what it pretends to be, and what it is isn’t interesting enough to survive on its own. Mildly amusing

Review – Thunderball

Like scuba footage? If so, boy are you in the right place. I didn’t time it, but it sure felt like the characters spent more time swimming around underwater than they did interacting on dry land. For a movie about diving, that would be okay. But this is a James Bond movie. And a bad one at that, easily the worst of the original Connery set. The villain is a lackluster guy whose sole personality trait appears to be an eye patch. Further, Bond seems to be losing his touch with the ladies. At one point he actually has to blackmail a woman into having sex with him. That might have been considered suave back in the 60s (though I doubt it), but in the 21st century it evokes the word “creep” if not the word “rapist.” Even the movie’s strong points are sub-par. For example, there’s a well-staged underwater battle sequence toward the end, but it goes on and on until even the most patient audience member is bound to get tired of it. If you’re trying to make your way through all the Bonds, you’re going to have to sit through this stinker at some point. Otherwise there are many better uses for your time and entertainment dollar, even in the Bond series. Wish I’d skipped it

Review – The Dukes of Hazzard

Okay, the guilt is on me for renting this when I knew perfectly well what to expect. My only excuse was that I hoped Johnny Knoxville might bring at least some semblance of sarcasm to the production. Instead, the “magic” seems to have worked in reverse, making him as bad as the rest of the movie. And truly bad it was, even worse than my memories of the TV series. Indeed, the only thing that stood out for me amid the general awfulness was the odd handling of the Confederate flag on the roof of the car. Unlike the series – which never seemed to give any thought to the subject – the movie acknowledges that some folks don’t care much for the emblem of the pro-slavery South. I would almost have preferred ignorance or even anti-PC pig-headedness to the attitude here, which had a disturbing “we know it’s wrong but we’re going to do it anyway” feel. Other than that this is exactly what one would expect: the redneck moral equivalent of gangsta rap. Oh, and I never saw the rated version so I can’t say for certain, but my guess is that the main distinction between the theatrical release and the unrated DVD (the version I saw) was the inclusion of a couple of completely superfluous boob shots (and no, they weren’t Jessica Simpson’s). Maybe a drug reference at the end or perhaps a couple of the raunchier jokes. But nothing to write home about. Wish I’d skipped it

Review – A Song Is Born

An audience is bored, is more like it. Rare indeed is the movie in which Danny Kaye gets upstaged, but it happens here for a couple of reasons. The main attraction of this production is the host of big band greats who turn in performances; indeed, fans of the era and its music should see this by all means. Unfortunately, that’s about all there is to it. The bulk of the picture’s running time is devoted to a trite (and I believe recycled) plot about a gangster’s girlfriend who plays a music nerd (Kaye) for a sap in order to escape the police, naturally falling in love with him in the process. Kaye has few if any chances to do the kind of physical comedy that made him a star, so he spends most of his time looking awkward. Come for the music if it’s your cup of tea, but don’t feel like you have to stay for the story. Mildly amusing

Review – Murderball

This is the most honest documentary about quadriplegics that I’ve ever seen. These guys aren’t saintly sweet physically-differently-abled people struggling to overcome their limitations. Instead they’re dramatic proof that rugby mooks in wheelchairs aren’t any different from rugby mooks who can walk. They’ve got the same ultra-macho drive to win games, drink beer, et cetera. And oddly enough, the story of the rivalry between the U.S. paralympic rugby team and a former member now coaching the Canadian squad makes for compelling viewing. At times it gets a little too MTV-reality-show-ish. I also thought the drama would have been stronger if the directors had done a better job covering the games themselves or at the very least keeping things in chronological order. Despite the odd editing, the personalities of the players serve to keep things interesting throughout. Mildly amusing

Review – Godzilla vs. Megaguirus

Oh the indignity! The mighty Godzilla reduced to the level of humble Orkin man. This is the worst job he’s had since he spent most of Godzilla vs. Hedorah working as a sewage treatment engineer. In this one, scientists try to invent a miniature black hole in order to destroy everyone’s favorite fire-breathing lizard (hey, he’s escaped from everything else, so why not try something that nothing can escape from?). The first test produces a dimensional rift, and out flies a giant bug. It lays an egg, and after a few more plot twists hundreds of smaller giant bugs emerge. They attack Godzilla and suck some of his energy out. They then take the energy back to Megaguirus, the biggest giant bug of all. Battle ensues. Overall this is a decent mix of plot and monster fights. If only the bad guy had been a little less buggy. Mildly amusing

Review – Godzilla vs. Hedorah

Also known as Godzilla vs. the Smog Monster, at least in its initial U.S. release. And aptly so, as the stupid thing basically amounts to a giant pile of flying sludge with eyes. Godzilla has battled some lame monsters in his time, but this has got to be the all-time lamest. Still, it’s nice to see everyone’s favorite giant, fire-breathing monster taking on the earth’s pollution problem. This is an early 70s production in every way from the clothes to the music (“Save the Earth! Save the Earth! Let’s start a revolution to stop pollution! Save the Earth!” or at least the Japanese equivalent thereof) to the odd animated sequences right on down to the radical environmentalism (Minimata Bay, anyone?). To top it all off, the final battle goes on and on, even after it should logically have ended. Mildly amusing

Review – Devil Dog: The Hound of Hell

You can tell Yvette Mimieux’s character is possessed by evil spirits, because she pretends to want to have sex with Richard Crenna. The creature of darkness responsible for such monstrous wickedness? A dog. A German shepherd (with lights aimed into his face to give him that spooky red-eye effect) that’s secretly a demonic glow-in-the-dark yappy dog complete with little horns. So the movie is almost completely undone by the cuteness of its supposedly-menacing villains, especially early on when the fluffy shepherd puppy psychically sets the maid on fire. With the fright factor gone, this is just an oh-so-70s production about a suburban family who bring a hell creature into their home. I enjoyed this immensely the first time I saw it, but on recent re-viewing I’m forced to confess that it’s a bit of a stinker. Mildly amusing

Review – Godzilla vs. Mechagodzilla

Jeez, could this thing have a little more plot? I know an excess of story isn’t something I usually gripe about. But in a Godzilla movie, who wants to watch actors endlessly muddling through some nonsense about space aliens who turn into apes when you shoot them? I’m here for the guys in monster suits smashing miniature cities and breathing fire on each other. Mechagodzilla (the Bionic Monster in the original U.S. release back in the 70s) is cool, even if some of his moves are borrowed from Johnny Socko’s Giant Robot. Godzilla’s ally, King Cesar, looks like a giant Pekingese (apologies to my four-year-old niece, who loves him). Nonetheless, the monster battles are as much fun as usual. They’re just far too infrequent. Mildly amusing

Review – Godzilla, Mothra and King Ghidorah

There was an additional title at the beginning of the movie, “All-Star Monster Mega-battle” or something like that. If that made the show sound like a pay-per-view WWF event, well, that was more than a little apt. The allegiances of the monsters in the Godzilla series are as hard to keep track of as the good guy / bad guy status of pro wrestlers. Originally Godzilla was a bad guy. Then in the 70s he became our planet’s champion against other giant monsters, usually creatures brought to earth by aliens. Now at the dawn of the new millennium he’s back in the bad guy seat again. Likewise, Ghidorah used to be three-headed muscle for extraterrestrial invaders. Now he’s teamed up with Mothra and Baragon to keep Godzilla from trashing Japan. The effects are slightly better than they used to be, or at least they’re more seamlessly integrated with the live action. Beyond that this is what we’ve come to expect from Godzilla movies, nothing more and nothing less. Mildly amusing

Review – Mr. and Mrs. Smith

Normally I don’t have a problem with a mix of action and comedy, but that assumes the action is exciting and/or the comedy is funny. Wrong on both counts here. It didn’t help that the plot was paper-thin. Two glamorous assassins are married to each other without being aware of their partners’ chosen careers. Once each finds out what the other does for a living, they spend a good-sized chunk of the rest of the movie trying to kill each other. And no, the logic really isn’t any better than that. Story aside, however, the movie falls flat because it fails to deliver either thrills or laughs. The gun battles in particular go on for so long and depend on so many ridiculous elements that they almost become self-parody. And the romantic comedy angle never rises above a bad episode of Friends. Honestly, there was as much entertainment value in the five minutes of back-story at the beginning of Spy Kids than there was in this expensive, two-hour debacle. See if desperate

Review – The Exorcism of Emily Rose

This might have been a better movie if only its creators had stuck with the horror angle rather than trying to turn the thing into a theology debate. Early on some of the effects are kinda spooky, and if the film-makers had just relied on this strong point they might have come up with something worth watching. But the story swiftly gets bogged down in courtroom drama that plays like the Scopes trial in reverse. The legal wrangling is filled with a legion of holes, but those are easy to ignore compared to the inadequate handling of the alleged battle between facts and faith. Indeed, once the priest is attacked by cats in the middle of the exorcism, the movie has lost any chance of being taken seriously. Later it turns out that poor Emily is possessed by not one but six different demons, including one that was once inside Nero and one that was once inside Judas. In the words of Father Karras from a considerably better exorcism movie, “that’s like claiming you’re Napoleon.” If that’s the best these folks could do, they should have stuck with simple shocks and left more profound thinking to minds that were up to the task. See if desperate

Review – The Big Easy

When doing a lot of location shooting in New Orleans, film-makers should take care not to let the backdrops overshadow their productions. Of course with acting this mediocre and a script this bad, the movie doesn’t stand a chance. Ellen Barkin wasn’t too bad, but whatever good she managed to do was immediately cancelled by Dennis Quaid’s witless smirking and come-and-go accent. The story was some mish-mash about corruption in the New Orleans police force, which turned out to be just as uninteresting as it sounded to begin with. And the sex scenes … yeech! Beyond the street scenes, the only real entertainment to be found here is a brief cameo by Judge Jim Garrison playing Judge Jim Garrison (several years before JFK). Someone with enough insider knowledge of the city to make such casting and location decisions really should have come up with a movie that did a better job of living up to the subject. Mildly amusing

Review – The Bad News Bears (2005)

They could have stopped the title after the first two words. The original was a clever production about a pack of misfit kids on a little league team coached by a cynical drunk with a heart of gold. This one’s ostensibly the same thing, but instead of clever it comes across as trite and vile. Part of the problem is that back in the 70s kids that swore and scrapped and otherwise misbehaved were a welcome divergence from the Brady Bunch vision of childhood that dominated the media at the time. Now foul-mouthed brats are a dime a dozen (and even at that price you’re being overcharged). Further, Walter Matthau worked in the coach role in ways Billy Bob Thornton can only dream of. In short, this was yet another entry in the long list of movies that weren’t crying out for a remake to begin with, and certainly didn’t deserve redoing like this. See if desperate

Review – The Red Shoes

This is a crucial, early point in the development of several film innovations, not the least among which are the extended dance number and the notion that women might actually like watching movies. But beyond its role in history, this is an interesting movie all on its own. A talented young ballerina is forced to choose between the two loves of her life: dancing and her composer boyfriend. Complicating matters is the sinister impresario who demands that if she is to dance that she devote herself entirely to her art, abandoning all else. The ballet that first makes her famous forms a story-within-a-story (not to mention an elaborate production that lasts somewhere between 15 and 20 minutes), transforming Hans Christian Anderson’s outré tale of evil shoes into an allegory about obsession. Worth seeing

Review – Biggie and Tupac

If there’s anyone in the whole wide world who could make a documentary about the deaths of Biggie Smalls and Tupak Shakur and not find concrete evidence of a conspiracy, that director would be Nick Broomfield. But of course as usual he isn’t making a documentary about his subject. He’s making a documentary about how righteously indignant he is that nobody will talk to him. Nobody, that is, except for the usual collection of nuts, pathological liars and a handful of other folks with nothing better to do with themselves than waste time with Broomfield. Oh, and he does manage to get into prison to interview Sug Knight toward the end, but by then Nick’s forgotten his title subjects and instead interviews Mr. Death Row about some hyped-up feud with Snoop Dogg. Snore. Indeed, “snore” on the whole movie. Wish I’d skipped it

Review – Genghis Blues

Blind blues singer Paul Pena is listening to his short-wave radio one night when he happens across a broadcast of Tuva throatsingers. He teaches himself to do this interesting trick, singing more than one note at a time. Then he journeys to Asia to meet some of the folks who do it for a living. He even manages to win a division in a national competition. The singing alone would have made a fascinating five-minute documentary, ten if they ever bothered to explain how it actually works. The trip might have been worth another five. But needless to say, this wasn’t a 15-minute movie. The bulk of the production is devoted to the uninteresting adventures of Pena and his troop of neo-hippie hangers-on as they wander aimlessly around. My personal favorite was the guy who was obsessed with his old pal Richard Feynman. Seriously, this guy just could not shut up about the dead mathematician. The final nail in the coffin was the graphic slaughter of a goat. That one scene alone cost this movie a star, maybe two. Wish I’d skipped it

Review - The Fantastic Four

After decades of planning to make a movie out of the foursome, this is what they come up with. First the good stuff. The effects were okay an a comic-bookish sort of way. And I came into the experience fully expecting to dish out a DRNPA to Jessica Alba. But oddly enough, she dodged the bullet. Part of her luck was that the script didn’t call on her to do a lot of hard-core science-ing. But what she did have to do, she managed to pull off better than I predicted. Now the bad news: that’s pretty much the limit of the good news. I was especially disappointed in the handling of Victor Von Doom. The doctor in the comic books had a certain Eastern European outsider mad genius quality to him. The guy in the movie came across as just another corporate wiener. Overall this was a mid-packer of a Marvel superhero movie, not as bad as The Hulk but most likely not the franchise feature that Spider-Man turned out to be. Mildly amusing

Review – The Island

I know I’ve griped several times in the past about movies – especially sci fi flicks – that turn out to be nothing but plot elements “borrowed” from other movies. But this is an especially bad case. Almost everything in this production from the big plot points down to the characters and dialogue comes across as vaguely familiar, recognizable from one previous effort or another (particularly Clonus where the similarities were so close that they inspired a settled-out-of-court lawsuit). As a result, this tale of clones discovering the sinister secret behind their true purpose in life will come across as fresh and entertaining only if you haven’t seen a sci fi movie in the last three or four decades. But if you don’t need a Cliff’s Notes primer on the genre, this won’t seem much more than expensive and stale. Oh, and it probably should have ended a half an hour or so before it actually did. See if desperate

Review – The Skeleton Key

The big star of this movie – at least from my perspective – was the atmosphere. I like all that steamy summer bayou stuff. It’s a terrific setting for a horror movie, especially a thriller that uses voodoo as a theme. But like just about every other voodoo movie ever made, this thing falls into the usual racist patterns of assuming that every black person in the universe is intimately acquainted with haints and spells. Even the beautiful, blonde protagonist’s urban black roommate has an aunt who goes to the conjure-woman. Further, the plot was a little too easy to stay ahead of. Beyond the clichés, however, this was an entertaining production. The art direction and audio (I especially liked the creepy old record of the voodoo ceremony) did at least part of what the script and acting couldn’t get done. Mildly amusing

Review – A Christmas Carol (1999)

Worst Dickens ever. I’ve seen this classic tale done by “talents” from Henry Winkler to Mickey Mouse, but honestly I’ve never seen such a parade of mediocre, phoned-in performances from experienced, professional actors. The odd part is that this is one of the few stories that can be overacted with impunity, and yet a cast full of folks with well-established histories of overacting decide to do little more than mumble their lines. Patrick Stewart in particular turns in one of the most lackluster jobs of his career, making his Scrooge almost impossible to feel for. Richard E. Grant also makes a crotchety Cratchet, his bad temper and bad teeth making him authentically English poor but not evocative of much sympathy. The ghosts were all weird as well, though the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come was the worst. He looked like an overblown refugee from Phantasm. As adaptations of Dickens’ novel grow more numerous and more technically sophisticated, it seems they also grow more soulless and dull. Wish I’d skipped it

Review – The Body Snatcher

Val Lewton produces. Robert Wise directs. Boris Karloff stars. Bela Lugosi even has a small role. The source story was by Robert Louis Stevenson. And the best this team of greats could come up with was this dreary little piece about a med school teacher tormented by his association with a “resurrectionist” who turns out to be a bit too zealous in his procurement tactics. The syrupy-sweet paraplegic child is either an interesting contrast to the cynical world of body snatching or just a dumb cliché, it’s hard to say exactly which. But by the time the movie draws to its “telltale heart” conclusion, there’s no doubt about the weakness of the script. The wanton killing of a small dog also served to knock this one down a peg. See if desperate

Review – The Big Sleep

I’ve seen this movie three or four times now, and I’ve completely given up trying to figure out what’s going on. Perhaps someday I’ll read the book so I can piece it together at my leisure. But then again, perhaps I won’t. The bewildering twists and turns are part of the pleasure, just like the hard-boiled dialogue and big-city-after-dark settings. Though I suppose The Maltese Falcon is considered the more perfect example of Bogart’s contribution to the film noir genre, in many ways I like this one better. Certainly the chemistry between the leading man and Lauren Bacall was hard to beat. So just as long as you aren’t trying to get it to make sense, this mystery is a thoroughly enjoyable experience. Worth seeing

Review – The Eagle Has Landed

This World War Two drama fits quite well with the mid-70s environment that spawned it. The Germans are the heroes, or anti-heroes if you prefer. A team of German paratroopers has been sent to Britain to kidnap Churchill. They’re being aided by an IRA insider (Donald Sutherland, with an Irish accent so bad it’s almost a shame he even bothered to try) and a woman whose family was killed by the English during the Boer war, two folks who seem to have a legitimate reason to want the Prime Minister dead. The plot gets blown when one of the troopers dies trying to rescue a child. In other words, this level of moral ambiguity is a far cry from the days of John Wayne and Audie Murphy. The first time I saw this was when it first came out, and the venue was one of the converted hallways upstairs at the Empire theater. It was hot and stuffy, and it was hard to pay attention to the picture. So it was nice to at least be able to watch it this time through. Mildly amusing

Review – Pope John Paul II

Even by made-for-TV standards, this one’s a stinker. It’s split into two parts (thus technically making it a miniseries), and the title character is played by two actors. In the first part the young Pole is portrayed by puffy-looking Cary Elwes. Then in the second half creepy Jon Voight takes on the role. But the casting is sheer genius compared to the script. Characters pop in and out of the Pope’s life so fast that the audience has little chance to figure out who they are, let alone care about their contributions to the story. The emphasis throughout is heavily placed on Polish nationalism, leaving the impression that the man made no other contribution to the world besides anti-Nazism and anti-Communism. The direction was likewise dreadful; just one of the production’s many faults was the constant, amateur-hour use of awkward wipes to move from location to location. While I suppose the subject had his faults, overall I think he deserved a better tribute than this. See if desperate

Review – Adaptation

As with Being John Malkovich, this production depends almost entirely on its own quirkiness. The story is standard writer-with-writer’s-block stuff, the story-within-a-story (the book the writer is supposed to be turning into a screenplay) is about a writer with the New Yorker working on a story about an obsessive orchid hunter. There’s a lot of ennui, alienation, et cetera, et cetera. A paragraph-review description can’t help but make the production sound silly, even somewhat masturbatory in a guy-writing-the-screenplay-of-his-own-life way. And in at least some ways this movie is just that. But a simple description sells the movie short, because its charm lies in the little twists and turns, the small visual tricks, the details rather than the bigger picture. I’m not sure that it works for the whole running time, but there’s enough fun here and there to keep it at least close to interesting. Mildly amusing

Review – On the Riviera

This old Danny Kaye movie is a remake of an even older Don Ameche movie. For the most part it’s fairly dreadful stuff, a witless little comedy of errors involving a nightclub performer impersonating a wealthy aviator/industrialist. Occasionally Kaye’s brilliant sense of comedic timing shines through, but for every funny moment there are multiple uninteresting plot twists or apropos-of-nothing musical numbers (including renditions of such immortal classics as “Ballin’ the Jack” and “Popo the Puppet”). What a waste of some really good talent. See if desperate

Review – Dickie Roberts: Former Child Star

This is the kind of movie that Showtime free preview weekends were made for. Paying for it – however indirectly – would merely add insult to injury. This movie has only two things going for it: an occasional bit of David Spade wit and a scattering of cameos from actual former child stars. The best part was a whole gaggle of these folk performing a “We Are the World” style song during the end credits. The rest is lame situation comedy and/or touchy-feely nonsense about a washed-up actor who pays a real family to help him relive a childhood he never had. See if desperate

Review – Dragon Seed

What an odd mix of contrary elements. This production is at once laudatory of and condescending to the peasant farmers of China. The first half hour or so is an endless parade of country bumpkin clichés with a fair amount of racist stereotyping (compounded by the fact that almost all the key characters are played by white actors). But once the Japanese soldiers show up to disrupt this rural idyll, this settles into a standard “This is the enemy” propaganda piece from World War Two. The script is stiff and the acting likewise. Katherine Hepburn’s portrayal of a young, idealistic woman is especially disappointing, so rigid that in places she seems to be concentrating so hard on being enigmatic that she actually appears to be blind. Or maybe it was just the eye makeup. Beyond a few interesting dips into socialism, this movie is probably best appreciated as a creature of its time. Mildly amusing

Review – Apollo 13

As one might expect given the subject matter, this is one of those movies that moves from one calamity to the next. As historical drama, it’s interesting. As storytelling, it’s more than a little tedious. Some of the special effects are fun, particularly the weightless stuff. Overall at least some affection for Hollywood and/or NASA will make this an easier pill to swallow. Verdict: mildly amusing.

Genre: Drama

Subgenre: Thriller
Date reviewed: 

Review – Diamonds Are Forever

With the probable exceptions of Thunderball and its off-brand remake, Never Say Never Again, this is the worst of the Connery Bonds. He’s too old for the part, and would have done better to have stayed gone after You Only Live Twice. As for the story itself, there isn’t much to it. There’s a Howard Hughes-esque character, a rare nod to the real world in a series that lives largely on the strictly imaginary. Beyond that just about the only unique feature is the pair of gay hit men. Oh, and the acrobatic female bodyguards Bambi and Thumper. Beyond that, this will be a necessary experience for anyone trying to watch all the Bond flicks but otherwise can safely be missed. See if desperate

Review – Rhapsody in August

Late in his career, Akira Kurosawa attempts to cope with the bombing of Nagasaki, an issue that even a half-century after the fact clearly hasn’t been faced by people on either side of the Pacific. The result is the compelling tale of four children spending the summer with their grandmother while their parents spend time overseas sucking up to rich Japanese-American relatives. At first the kids are anxious to persuade the old woman to journey to Hawaii to meet her long-lost, dying brother. But as they experience the lingering traces of the A-bomb – not the least of which is the death of their grandfather – the kids gain new perspective on the importance of the past. The production doesn’t offer much for movie-goers who are strictly fans of the director’s samurai-intensive work, but anyone willing to give this quiet little story a chance will find patience richly rewarded. Worth seeing

Review – The Hollow

No doubt a description of the heads of some of the folks involved in creating this charming little production. Actually, I’ve seen worse horror movies. I like the whole Headless Horseman thing, so it simultaneously pleased me to see a new twist on the tale and saddened to see this new twist turn Washington Irving’s villain into a run-of-the-mill supernatural serial killer. The script was a little weak, but at least they tried using one rather than just wasting 90 minutes hacking people up. The cast features a gaggle of B-minus celebrities, including Stacy Keach as the annoying old man who seems to be the only one who knows what’s going on. Even the effects are middle-of-the-road, cheap but not so terrible that they detract from the production. The result is one of the two-est of all two-star movies I’ve ever seen. Mildly amusing

Review – Duck Soup

Though I’m sure this was revolutionary stuff back in 1933, at this point in film history the Marx Brothers are a bit of an acquired taste. They’re good and all, but they take a little getting used to. I was also surprised at how close some of their routines are to the comparatively low-brow Three Stooges. That aside, this is a solid piece of comedy. Sure, a lot of Groucho’s shtick is cliché, but it wouldn’t be cliché now if he hadn’t done it so well and made it so famous back when it was fresh. And Harpo’s physical comedy never gets old. I could spend hours watching the scenes where he and Chico scrap with the lemonade vendor. This production is also notable for its cleverly subtle exploration of themes that Chaplin would take on with a more ham-handed approach later in The Great Dictator. Overall this is a funny if somewhat dated bit of entertainment. Worth seeing

Review – Dead Men Walking

This movie has more puking than movies about puking. Zombie blood barf appears to be the theme of the first half of the production. But once most of the cast finally makes the transition to zombie-dom, it’s mostly straight splatter from there. All you need to know about the plot is that the dreaded zombie virus gets loose in a maximum security prison, transforming prisoners and guards alike into the rampaging undead. For awhile there’s some pretense at dialogue, all whispered in sub-sonic levels in keeping with Asylum’s usual technical standards. But that’s swiftly abandoned in favor of endless gore shots. In a way, the honest embrace of pointless carnage in place of a plot actually made this a slightly better movie than it might otherwise have been. Verdict: see if desperate

Review - Fever Pitch

The baseball parts of this production aren’t too terrible, but the romance woven through the Red Sox 2004 season isn’t anywhere near as interesting as the game. Of course with a finish like the 2004 baseball season, it was hard for Hollywood to come up with anything to match the drama of “real life.” Even so, this production falls considerably short. Jimmy Fallon does a much better job as an obsessive Sox fan than he does as a romantic lead. And though Drew Barrymore has successfully played the foil to Adam Sandler in the lovable loser / cute girl story line at least twice now, here her performance with Fallon comes across as mailed in. The result is a romantic comedy where the romance doesn’t work at all. See if desperate

Review – Legion of the Dead

Do six mummies and a reanimated nekkid Egyptian queen really constitute a legion? Perhaps they should have called it “Legion of the Plot Holes So Huge You Could Build a Pyramid in One.” Low production values. Virtually script-free. Zach “Gremlins” Galligan and Bruce “Not Mark Hamil” Boxleitner were the acting highlights, and the director took pity on Galligan and killed his character off early. The rest is strictly amateur hour, with a handful of “college students” stumbling around a story that has something to do with bringing aforementioned queen and minions back from the dead to rule the universe or some such. The only real distinction here is that this has to be one of the all-time worst sound jobs I’ve ever suffered through. The dialogue is whisper-quiet, requiring viewers to turn the sound up so high that loud sound effects (particularly the apropos-of-nothing thunderclaps that frequently punctuate scenes) become eardrum-destroying assaults. Other than that, if cheap gore and a minimal number of bare boob shots float your boat, then prepare for your boat to be floated. Otherwise avoid with care. Wish I’d skipped it

Review – Dominion

Wow, did this one ever end up taking a strange path to the screen. After Paul Shrader’s prequel to The Exorcist didn’t work with test audiences, the studio brought in Renny Harlin to completely re-shoot the movie. And now I guess Warner has decided to recoup some of its losses by DVD’ing the Shrader cut as well. Oddly enough, I think somewhere between these two productions might have been a really good horror movie. Harlin’s version is too stupid to be engaging, but this outing’s too boring to be scary. I really liked the emphasis on the archaeological, especially early on. The script was also reasonably well put-together. On the other hand, the thrills here were few and far between. And the characters were more engaging in the other one. When you do less with your actors than Renny Harlin does, that says nothing good about your picture. Taken together, these two pictures would make an interesting – if somewhat disorienting – double feature. Mildly amusing

Review – Madagascar

This is a cute movie, but it might have worked just about as well as a screen saver as it does as a feature-length production. The computer-animated animals are entertaining, particularly the penguins and the lemurs. Beyond the cuteness, though, there isn’t much here. Indeed, what little plot does manage to develop seems poorly thought-out. Zoo animals end up “returned” to the wild, where it turns out the lion is actually a carnivore. What are we to take away from this? As one might expect from a Dreamworks kid-oriented DVD, we get a ton of extras on the disc, including a short starring the penguins, who rightfully turned out to be the most popular characters in the picture. Mildly amusing

Review – War of the Worlds (2005)

I’ve seen a lot of bad movies in my life. Heck, I’ve seen a lot of bad movies this year. But this is the first bad movie in awhile that I’d actually classify as a disappointment. Though Wells’ novel wasn’t an eternal work of staggering genius, it could nonetheless have been turned into an entertaining – maybe even interesting – movie. Certainly this monster-budget picture had all the technical quality needed to pull it off. But then Tom Cruise gets cast in the lead role. His charmless charm and witless smirking may have made him ideal for roles in movies such as Top Gun, but two decades later it just doesn’t work anymore. I also suspect Cruise’s presence may have been in some way connected to the Scientology elements that appear to have crept into the story. But oddly enough, the direction is far worse than the acting. I’ve never been the world’s biggest Spielberg fan, but in the past I’ve at least been impressed by his ability to pace a production. But no longer, or at least not here. The story moves relentlessly from one peril to the next with almost no gaps in between for plot or character development. The result is a two-hour movie-going experience roughly akin to the interminable chase sequence in Texas Chainsaw Massacre only with Martians instead of a guy with a chainsaw and the entire human race rather than a teenage girl. The combination of Wells, 9/11 and a lot of expensive effects could have been used to make a much better movie. See if desperate

Review – L.I.E.

Brian Cox plays a chicken hawk. He’s the hero (or at least the only sympathetic character in the protagonist’s life). You can pretty much draw your own conclusions from there. Perhaps if I’d ever been a gay teenager coming to grips with my sexuality amid the chaotic ennui of the Long Island burbs, I might have had a little more sympathy for this picture. As things stand, however, I mostly thought it was boring, predictable and more than a little too morally ambiguous, particularly on the topic of child molestation. Wish I’d skipped it

Review – The Piano Teacher

She’s a very kinky girl, the kind you don’t take home to mother. Except in this case she already lives with mother, at one point even attempting to rape the old lady. That should provide a sample of the flavor here. This is basically Alt.sex.bondage The Motion Picture. The protagonist is a piano teacher (hence the title) leading a repressed little life of Schubert and masturbatory kink. Along comes an attractive young student who wants a normal – or at least normal by comparison – relationship with her. The two wrangle back and forth in an exceptionally boring manner. In a more interesting movie some of the bizarre sex might have struck me as innovative, but here it’s just the creepy icing on an annoying cake. See if desperate

Review – Good Night, and Good Luck

This was a good movie, which is unfortunate because in more skillful hands this could have been a great movie. Murrow’s battle against McCarthy was a fascinating and most film-worthy tale. David Straithairn does an excellent job in the lead, backed by a solid supporting cast. However, the script (when not quoting Murrow’s broadcasts directly) and the direction are weak. It wasn’t all bad. For example, I appreciated the decision to include some dry humor here and there. It was just so ham-handed. For example, try playing a drinking game in which you do a shot every time a group of characters is sitting around having a conversation when suddenly someone enters the scene to solemnly announce the next major plot development. You’ll be plastered (if not dead from alcohol poisoning) by the end of the movie. Further, those not old enough to remember McCarthyism directly (a good-sized chunk of the audience by now) might have been better served by at least some indication of the depths of the menace of the HUAC (Guilty By Suspicion did a better job with this). Without the full sense of paranoia, Murrow appears to be crusading based solely on principle rather than out of a desperate need to rid the country of a great wrong. All that aside, however, this is an hour and a half of solid, inspirational entertainment. Worth seeing

Review – Cinemania

I didn’t think this was nearly as funny as it was supposed to be. The blurb on Netflix made this sound like a documentary along the lines of Trekkies only about movie buffs rather than Star Trek fans. But the five people trailed during the production of this movie aren’t fans. They’re mentally ill people with obsessive fixations on movies. Though one might argue that fandom in general is a mild form of neurosis, these folks are well past the mild stages. In particular, Roberta is so far gone that she appears to sit on the verge of the “danger to self or others” standard for involuntary commitment. Even her more functional compatriots left jobs, friends, family and any other semblance of normalcy behind long ago in favor of trying to see as many movies as possible. Mocking Star Trek nerds is bad enough, but making fun of sick people sinks to a whole new level. See if desperate

Review – The Fog (2005)

Ever see a movie in which a character – a real, historical figure for example – is played by a bad actor who makes a mess of the role? This is like that, only it’s a whole movie pretending to be an earlier production. Some of the effects are bush leagues fun, but overall this is a muddled, messy version of the original. Even the casting is odd, with no big-name stars (at least the first one had Janet Leigh) and Selma Blair playing Stevie Wayne despite the fact that she doesn’t look anywhere near old enough to be the mother of a tween-ager. If Carpenter and Bottin had access to some of the digital effects used in this effort, they could have made a movie good enough to render a remake completely pointless. As it was, there didn’t turn out to be that much point to it anyway. See if desperate

Review – Doom

The cut scenes from the game had a better plot. Or at the very least, the plot in the game was clearer and more engaging. Here character motivations are frequently so poorly constructed that it’s hard to believe anyone is doing what they’re doing. Toward the beginning the already-more-or-less-interchangeable Marines get shuffled around so frequently that it’s impossible to keep track of who’s doing what. This problem resolves itself when the monsters start whittling the cast down a bit, but by then it’s already more than a little hard to care about any of the remaining characters. By the end the production breaks down into an extended sequence of first-person-shooter framing followed by that great dark spot endemic to the action movie: the extended hand-to-hand combat sequence. The final result falls well short of the entertainment value of the games (even the old, motion-sickness-inducing versions), and given that the only audience for the movie is probably the game’s fans, I wasn’t exactly surprised to find myself completely alone in the theater just a week or two after the movie’s release. See if desperate

Review – Capote

Here’s the behind-the-scenes story for In Cold Blood, a dramatized, behind-the-scenes peek at Truman Capote’s work with Smith, Hickock and the good folks of Holcomb. Philip Seymour Hoffman does a surprisingly good job in the title role. The self-caricature mannerisms of the flamboyant author alone would have been easy to mimic, but Hoffman brings a much greater depth to the character. The result is one of those movies that leaves you wondering just how much of it is true. The story departs from the book in some small details, but of course Capote doesn’t say anything himself about things like lying to the killers to retain their confidence or ceasing his support of their appeals in order to hasten the end of the story so he can finish his work. I was in the middle (actually closer to the end) of the book when I went to see the movie, and the two made an interesting combination. Worth seeing

Review – The Rookie

Baseball and kids and the triumph of the underdog … throw in Disney, and you’ve got a pretty good idea what’s in store here. This is the true story of a small town Texas baseball coach (Dennis Quaid alternately smirking and scowling through another role) with a miracle fastball that takes him to the majors (or at least to the Devil Rays) by the end of the picture. The thing I found most interesting about this production was the almost complete lack of antithesis. The guy’s dad is kind of a creep, and his wife rags on him in a couple of scenes. But for the most part there’s no opposition, just a slow, steady rise to success. The result is a sentimental little picture that’s fun to watch if you’re a baseball fan with a couple of hours to kill on a brain-dead weekend evening. Mildly amusing

Review – City of God

Believe it or not, I actually expected the slums of Rio de Janeiro to be worse than this. Indeed, aside from the drug-related violence, this place didn’t seem all that bad. Of course the violence is overpowering stuff, certainly the focus of this tale about a boy growing up amid brutal gang wars. Based on a true story and filmed on location, this movie nonetheless has a well-produced feel to it. Yeah, you have to read subtitles. But beyond that this is a gangster movie worthy of anything Hollywood has churned out in recent years, made all the better by the absence of sugar coating. Worth seeing

Review – The Freshman

The first time I saw this movie was when it was originally released. Back then I was a film student myself, so it wasn’t too hard for me to be charmed by this tale of a fish-out-of-water kid from Vermont (Matthew Broderick) who ends up pulled into a bewildering series of plots in the Big City. Naturally Brando is great as the mastermind behind the scheme, re-creating one of his most famous characters so closely that the original’s studio sued. Throw in Penelope Ann Miller as the love interest and a water monitor lizard playing a Komodo dragon, and the set is complete. Fans of the serious cinema won’t get much out of this fluffy caper flick. But then fans of the serious cinema might see themselves a little to clearly reflected in the obnoxious professor, a character every film student must know in one form or another. The scene in which the gangster’s daughter makes an idiot of the windbag is a sanity-saving moment for anyone who’s ever studied cinema under such a creature. Worth seeing

Review – A Dirty Shame

I’m sorry, John Waters. I really tried with this one. I wanted to see some of the guts it took to make Multiple Maniacs and Pink Flamingos. Certainly there’s some thematic similarity. However, it just doesn’t work. Part of the problem is that society has moved on a bit from the 1960s. While “perverted” sex isn’t openly embraced across the board, as a nation we’ve at least managed to reach a mind-your-own-business accommodation with most of the weird things people like to do behind closed doors. The other problem is that once you’ve gone Hollywood it’s darn difficult to go back. As a result, this comes across as Cecil B. Demented using sex in the place of indie film-making. The joke isn’t the worst one ever told. Waters retains his gift for obscure off-the-rack music, adding his aplomb for library footage to put together some entertaining hallucination montages. But it gets old after awhile. Really old. There’s just a limit to the number of times I want to hear Johnny Knoxville yell “Let’s go sexin’!” within the course of a single movie, or even the course of a single lifetime. Mildly amusing

Review – Matewan

This is the most blatant piece of pro-labor propaganda since Eisenstein’s Battleship Potemkin. And like its predecessor, it’s also an extremely effective piece of film-making. John Sayles brings the full force of his skills as a writer and director to the task of portraying the start of the coal field wars to the silver screen. The characters are interesting, however cliché they may be. The plot tends to wander on occasion, but the story stays interesting throughout. Sure, the forces of justice triumph with a level of convenience usually reserved for episodes of Superfriends. But darn it, sometimes it’s nice to see people who deserve to win actually triumph in the end (and even frequently throughout the rest of the two and a half hours of the picture’s running time as well). For my money, the movie is worth seeing just for the scene in which David Straithairn’s character expresses his opinion of the owner of the detective agency that sends strike breakers to the town. Buy the disc

Review – The Triplets of Belleville

This odd animated tale of a kidnapped bicyclist has to have been the strangest Oscar nominee in history, if for no other reason than the almost complete absence of appeal to American audiences. The first few minutes are an interesting swirl of Sally Cruikshank and Chuck Jones. But as soon as the actual story gets underway, the movie turns into a muddled mess. Whoever made this unfortunately seems to have learned the craft at the knee of the Film Board of Canada, taking to heart lessons about the importance of minimal plot and dialogue and extreme affection for laborious pacing. Indeed, were it not for occasional bursts of impressive technical quality I could have sworn that I was back in the nightmare realm of the animation festivals that were common in art houses back in the 80s. See if desperate

Review – Waiting

For better or worse, this is one of those movies where you get exactly what you pay for. So if you’re in the mood for a vulgar mix of Van Wilder, Office Space and Applebee’s, you’re in the right place. The resulting burgoo is an uneven blend of extremely funny moments spread out across long stretches of completely unnecessary plot and character development. I suppose this tale of what really goes on in the kitchen should be mandatory viewing for anyone who’s planning on being rude to the wait staff at a restaurant. Beyond that, however, redeeming qualities are few and far between. See if desperate

Review – Kinsey

Several times in other reviews I’ve complained about movie biographies that dwell excessively on their subjects’ sex lives. In this case, however, I suppose focusing on the intimate is at least somewhat justified. It’s also hard not to read a lot of one’s personal views into this. For example, I saw a portrait of a scientist who discovers that he likes sex and sets out to understand why. However, there are other elements here. Someone who sides with the conservative group that named Kinsey’s book one of the ten most dangerous works ever published might see this as the story of a man made desperately unhappy by his abandonment of faith and his unhealthy obsession with physical pleasure. Regardless of viewpoint, I thought this was a better movie than some critics indicated. I wonder if particularly male reviewers weren’t a bit disappointed that there wasn’t more sex in the movie. Mildly amusing

Review – Hellraiser: Hellworld

And yet they keep making them. In a realm beyond pleasure, beyond pain, beyond plot and character, beyond logic, beyond special effects, beyond acting, beyond directing, in the farthest extremes of human experience, dwells crap like this. The acorn that fell from the Barker tree nearly 20 years ago just keeps rolling and rolling, eventually making it all the way to the land of I Know What You Did Last Summer. Doing the whole reflexive thing late in the series worked for Freddy Krueger, but this movie doesn’t give it enough of a chance. There’s a lot of nonsense about computer games and cell phones. Doug Bradley puts in an appearance, though it’s more for show than anything else. There’s also a smattering of soft core porn, but it doesn’t work any better than the rest of the movie. Overall, well, there is no “overall” analysis because the movie isn’t structured as a cohesive whole. Instead it’s a patchwork of dumb little ideas, most of which don’t work on their own and none of which work together. Wish I’d skipped it

Review – Maria Full of Grace

So what you’re saying is that it sucks to be a drug mule, huh? Who would have thought? Pretty teen Maria (Catalina Sandino Moreno) hates her crummy job in a flower factory, so she quits. Unemployed and a couple months pregnant, in semi-desperation she decides to take a high-paying job as a smuggler. Overall I was somewhat disappointed by this production. Aside from a couple of too-strong-for-TV scenes, this comes across as a Spanish-language version of an Afterschool Special about the evils of the narcotics trade. A few parts are challenging to sit through, as one might expect when watching someone swallow fifty cocaine capsules or endure an international flight with a load of coke in her guts. But beyond that the story was bland, sometimes even cliché-ridden. I think the movie does what it sets out to do. I just expected a bit more. And on a somewhat irrelevant note, I can’t think about this movie without being reminded of the Weekend Update joke on Saturday Night Live reporting on a woman caught smuggling snails into the country, the punch line suggesting that she would be the subject of an upcoming movie entitled Maria Full of Snails. Mildly amusing

Review – Vietnam: A Television History

Sure, this is a miniseries rather than a movie. But after sitting through 11 hours of this, I feel a review of some sort is in order. There’s some really incredible footage here, particularly film shot by both sides on the ground during the war. Overall, as one might expect from such an ambitious project, the results are mixed. Any audience member is probably going to get more out of some episodes than others, and I’m no exception. I’m more interested in the early history of the war and the expansion into Laos and Cambodia than I am in some other Vietnam-related stuff such as the history of the protest movement. Accordingly, I’d like to watch some episodes again and others I regret watching at all. But anyone with an interest in the subject should check this out. Mildly amusing

Review – London After Dark

Half an E for effort to Turner Classic Movies. It isn’t every channel that will show a movie whose only surviving print was destroyed in a fire in the 50s. What we’ve got here, then, looks like an extended PowerPoint presentation cobbled together from a substantial supply of production stills. It’s fun to see some of Lon Chaney’s makeup, and the show gives some idea of how the plot was structured. However, there’s almost no sense at all of Todd Browning’s directing skill. As wonderful as it would have been to see Browning and Chaney paired up on the silver screen, this is a poor substitute for a real movie. It doesn’t help that the rich-guy-turned-vampire-sucking-English-blood story is more than a little evocative of another Browning production with a classic horror movie star produced just a few years later. The folks who threw this together had their hearts in the right place, and they did a good job with what they had to work with. Sadly, it just wasn’t enough. Mildly amusing

Review - Faith and Doubt at Ground Zero

Technically this is an episode of Frontline, but it’s movie-length and certainly worthy of the title “documentary,” so I’m gonna go ahead and review it. Parts of this piece were fascinating, particularly the Sept. 11 footage that many other news outlets have shied away from showing (such as people jumping out of the upper floors of the World Trade Center). Some of the interviews also made for interesting viewing. If nothing else, the film-makers did a solid job of capturing a range of reactions to the tragedy. However, some of the discourse was more than a little weak. I was particularly disappointed by the section on the nature of evil. I thought surely some of the people who had stared such experiences directly in the face would have put at least some thought into the subject, perhaps finding a way to go beyond George Bush’s “Legion of Doom versus the Superfriends” approach to the question. Sadly, most of the subjects came up lacking. But overall this was an interesting if not always enlightening exploration of the interaction between tragedy and religious belief. Mildly amusing

Review – A Comedy of Terrors

If this isn’t the all-time champion, it’s at least one of the most flagrant cases of movies that squander good casts. Vincent Price, Peter Lorre, Boris Karloff, and Basil Rathbone struggle with dialogue so bad it could make an audience get up and leave a dinner theater production. Even Rhubarb the Cat looks like he can’t wait for the director to call “cut” so he can rush back to his trailer, call his agent and scream his lungs out. I suppose this silliness is supposed to be vaguely reminiscent of Poe, but if Poe is fine, fresh French pastry then this is a Twinkie that rolled under a car seat two years ago and has been there ever since. Wish I’d skipped it

Review – Return of the Living Dead

Dan O’Bannon takes the zombies from Night of the Living Dead, twists the rules around a little, and comes up with monsters a lot more menacing than Romero’s. Then he turns around and squanders them on what for the most part is that most annoying of productions: the horror comedy. There are a few thrills to be found here and there, but for the most part this is just a bit too silly. Oh, and very, very 80s. Mildly amusing

Review – Sin City

As one might expect from Frank Miller, the art direction is as excellent as the rest of the movie is dreadful. I was genuinely impressed with just how well Miller’s design work made the jump to the screen, thanks in large part to the power of digital special effects. The result is a movie that is a lot of fun to look at. It’s almost enough. Almost. The problem here is that along with Miller’s art comes Miller’s writing, and no amount of high tech manipulation can fix it. What works well in graphic novels sometimes comes across as stiff and corny on film, and unfortunately that applies to a lot of the plot and almost all the dialogue in this production. I also didn’t care much for some of the casting, though I concede that the actors were all appropriate to their roles. Overall I was sorry that this disc had to go back to the video store, because I would have liked to have watched it again with the sound off just to see if it was any better that way. Mildly amusing

Review – Death 4 Told

It’s been a long, long time since I’ve seen a low-budget horror movie I actually liked. And though this single effort doesn’t exactly revive my faith in the sub-genre as a whole, it at least stirred a little hope. As implied by the title, this is a set of four vignettes cleverly interwoven without benefit of a bracketing story. The second tale is more than a little mediocre, overshadowed even by the original short version that’s included in the DVD’s special features. However, the first story has the same disregard for complexity that made the Scary Stories series such fun to read. The third and fourth outings are clever enough without being too inspiring. To be sure the director makes plenty of rookie mistakes, especially in the editing process. However, my hat’s off to anyone who can take kisses-of-death like Margot Kidder and Tom Savini and still churn out a reasonably entertaining product. Mildly amusing

Review – The Thing Below

Imagine a movie cheap and unimaginative enough to be truly worthy of such a title. Imagine Deep Rising reshot with bargain basement special effects. Imagine yourself renting something else. Terrible performers struggle to act out a story so stupid it actually sucks IQ points out of your head while you watch it. My particular favorite aspect of this production was the “clever” twist that an un-killable sea monster somehow has to use its power to cloud its victims’ minds before tearing them limb from limb. Illogical to the extreme, but it gave the director an excuse to stir in a western gunfight and a strip tease apropos of nothing. As much as I’d like to support low-budget horror movies, I need them to meet me at least partway. This one doesn’t make any effort at all. Wish I’d skipped it

Review – Alexander

Any further complaints from Arlen Specter and Jack Valenti about Oliver Stone playing fast and loose with history? Not this time around? Hmmm. Well, that’s okay. Departures from the historical record aren’t exactly the biggest problem here. That distinction belongs to the script, which is as intensely boring as it is poorly put together. The action bounces back and forth randomly in the time line, with an astounding amount of screen time devoted to go-nowhere speeches. The direction doesn’t help either, as Stone makes copious use of pace killers such as extended shots of Colin Ferrel and the rest of the cast gaping vacantly into space. Stir in a heap of animal violence and this one’s headed for the reject pile. However, the production was plenty expensive, with some of the money going for effects that work well enough (especially compared to the rest of the picture). See if desperate

Review – The Red Violin

Samuel L. Jackson stars in this busy little movie that follows a violin made by a master through a handful of owners. The intent here appears to be to create an anthology of vaguely depressing short subjects intertwined around basic human themes such as love, genius, lust and loss. That may sound a little weak, but the concepts around which the drama is built were actually fairly solid. This started out with the potential to be a good movie. However, the international crew of film-makers appears to be trying to pack too many elements into one picture. In particular, the tarot theme of one of the two bracketing stories struck me as unnecessary. I also didn’t care for the subtitling scheme. I don’t like English subtitles over actors who are already speaking English, yet the movie’s propensity to break into Italian or some other language without notice made it necessary to keep them on constantly. And even when the subtitles were appropriate, they were sometimes grossly insufficient. My particular favorite was the point during the Chinese vignette when one of the subtitles said nothing more than “(speaking Chinese).” No kidding. Overall the movie’s heart was in the right place, but it fell a little short in the execution department. Mildly amusing

Review – XXX: State of the Union

Despite the big budget and expensive effects, this was an intensely dreadful movie. Bad actors (with the exception of Samuel L. Jackson, whom I hope got paid a bundle for subjecting himself to this) deliver dialogue too stiff and corny for 70s-era comic books. I actually felt sorry for Ice Cube, who has gone from vocals on “Burn Hollywood Burn” to reciting lines that sound like they came from the “Black Acting School” sequence of Hollywood Shuffle. And I thought the first one was bad! Well okay, the first one was bad. But at least in episode one they were trying to do some kind of Bond rework. This time around it’s more like a blaxploitation version of a Chuck Norris flick glossed over with a coating of “Pimp My Ride” (complete with Xibit no less). See if desperate

Review – S21: The Khmer Rouge Killing Machine

Here’s yet another low-budget documentary that thrives almost exclusively on the inherent impact of its subject. The production is nothing but cheap video shot and edited awkwardly. But whatever the producers lack in technical skills they more than make up for with their premise and connections. Put a couple of former victims of the Khmer Rouge torture houses in the same room with their former tormentors and you’re almost automatically going to end up with a fascinating movie. However, even more chilling than the confrontations were the scenes in which the former guards re-enacted the routine abuse of prisoners, pantomiming torture and murder with thin air for a victim. This doesn’t really reveal anything new about Cambodia in the 70s, but it does give the viewer an up-close look at the conflicted participants in the otherwise-faceless mass-extermination operation. Mildly amusing

Review – Team America: World Police

For the most part this plays like an extended episode of Robert Smigel’s “Go Lords” with a big dose of Parker/Stone humor thrown in. In other words, it’s puppets that have sex, barf and swear. A lot. On the other hand, it has a few funny moments, such as when a couple of members of Team America are attacked by housecats. And it’s nice to see anyone with the guts to mock the witless pseudo-patriotism that’s captured the nation’s attention of late. This isn’t insightful social commentary by a long shot, but as vulgar amusement I guess I’ve seen worse. Or at least more pointless. Mildly amusing

Review – Downfall

We first met Traudl Junge in Blind Spot: Hitler’s Secretary, a low-budget documentary in which she tells the fascinating story of her life. Now the story hits the silver screen again, re-done as a big budget dramatic narrative production, a re-enactment of Junge’s memories with the perspectives of other participants thrown in for good measure. The result is as powerful as one would expect a tale to be when it’s set in the Fuhrerbunker in late April and early May 1945. I think this would make an interesting double feature with Gone with the Wind. They’re both really long, but in the end it would be worth it to see the death of American slavery and the death of German Nazism side by side (or at least back to back). At least one of the two countries that produced the two movies appears able to come to grips with the evil of its subject matter. Worth seeing

Review – Chupacabra Terror

At least unlike Bloodthirst this one actually has a Chupacabra. It also has Giancarlo Esposito and John Rhys-Davies, both of whom need to get new agents. The plot here is sort of like Alien redone as an episode of The Love Boat. The monster looks like a cross between one of the monsters from Humanoids from the Deep and a limp head of lettuce. I’m not sure what would attract actual actors to such a production. Perhaps it had something to do with the tropical vacation getaway shooting locations. This might have scored a single star if not for yet another messy, unnecessary slaying of a dog. Wish I’d skipped it

Review – Hearts and Minds

Funny how political polemic in a documentary can change audience perceptions over the course of three decades. Or in simpler terms, this movie must have looked a lot different to audiences in 1974 than it does now. Of course the Iraq mess we’re in as I write this review adds a little chill to one veteran’s observation that we aren’t going to learn anything from the fiasco that was Vietnam. However, taken within its own context this is an interesting production about the many aspects of U.S. involvement in Vietnam in the late 60s and early 70s. The editing clearly reveals this as an anti-war piece; for example, Westmoreland’s assertion that Asian people don’t feel emotional loss the way Americans do is juxtaposed with post-bombing footage of Vietnamese civilians proving him oh so very wrong. But political agenda set aside, this movie has some genuinely extraordinary footage and serves as a fascinating portrait of a moment in U.S. history. Worth seeing

Review – The Stunt Man

I watched this with some friends, and all of us remembered liking it better back when we first saw it in the early 80s than we do now. So perhaps it isn’t the movie’s fault that it falls a little flat. Steve Railsback’s performance is a little too reminiscent of his Charles Manson from Helter Skelter, and that detracts from things a bit. On the other hand, Peter O’Toole is perfect as Eli, the psychotic god of the movie within a movie. Barbara Hershey is also above her average. I think the main problem is that the picture dwells on the characters’ attempts to retain their sanity in an insane environment without bothering to convince us that any of them were sane to begin with. Still, it has enough clever moments to keep it entertaining. Mildly amusing

Review – Constantine

Sometimes comic books make a successful jump to the big screen. But step one in the process is almost always an act of translation, figuring out what elements are going to work in a movie and what’s going to have to be left behind. Unfortunately the folks who made this picture decided to haul the whole comic thing into the movie version. The plot. The awkward dialogue. The teen-oriented pseudo-theology. Even many of the camera angles are sharply evocative of comic panels. Also, here’s yet another movie with awful sound mixing, screeching noise intermixed with dialogue so soft I had to turn on the subtitles. And then there’s Keanu Reeves’s almost constant coughing. Just so I don’t seem like I do nothing but gripe, I did like some of the special effects. If they’d been put to a better use as part of a better movie, they might have been downright fun. Mildly amusing

Review – Urban Legends: Bloody Mary

Not as good as the first one, but not as bad as the second. Given that quality is a relative thing down at this end of the scale, I suppose it could have been worse. Once again the use of urban legends is a little weak. For example, the hand-licking murderer is an element of one death, but it’s at best and awkward fit with the scene as a whole (not to mention a really fake but entirely unnecessary dog death). And is there an urban legend somewhere about a guy frying himself by pissing on an electric fence? Or is that just a rhyme from Beavis and Butt-Head? And clearly I’m back in practice now, because I pegged the culprit in this one early on (not that it was much of a challenge). The script isn’t long in the logic department, but the story keeps moving well enough. Some of the booga-booga shots aren’t bad, either. Especially the ones stolen from The Ring (along with a chunk of the plot). See if desperate

Review – Hide and Seek

This is one of those movies where from the first moment you see the family cat you instantly know she isn’t going to make it to the end of the picture. Ditto with Elizabeth Shue. We also have a host of other small problems throughout, not the least of which is that Robert DeNiro is a bit too old to play a guy with a kid Dakota Fanning’s age. Unfortunately this entry is the latest in a long line of productions in which the only real pleasure to be had is in figuring out the turn of the screw before the screw actually gets turned. The big drawback to such movies in the age of DVDs is that technology now makes it possible to pinpoint the precise minute and second where the twist becomes obvious (just about exactly 36 minutes in for me). And that of course leaves you with an all-too-accurate calculation of how many minutes and seconds of your life you wasted waiting for the story to catch up. Insult to injury is that the damn thing keeps going for awhile even after they come out and tell you who Charlie is. End result: yet another un-thrilling thriller. See if desperate

Review – 9/11

Here’s the ultimate proof of the new, 21st century key to successful journalism: skill and talent often aren’t half as important as having the luck to be in the right place at the right time. Here we have two French guys with low-end-professional video cameras who just happened to be making a documentary about New York City firefighters in the Summer and Fall of 2001. Along comes September 11 and transforms their run-of-the-mill production into some of the most compelling images ever captured on tape. The footage shot inside the towers as the firefighters try desperately to get a grip on the situation is alone worth the price of the rental. And when the tower collapses around them … well, you just have to see it for yourself. Some of this documentary is a little hard to watch, and especially toward the end veers unnecessarily into the sentimental (the video speaks for itself, so there’s really no need to drop “Danny Boy” onto the soundtrack). I came into this thinking it was somewhat pretentious to call a movie “9/11,” as if this was the only documentary that could ever be made on the subject (which of course it isn’t). But what these guys captured at Ground Zero actually merits the title they gave it. Worth seeing

Review – Full Eclipse

Vigilante commando supercop junkie werewolves. No kidding. And as an extra added bonus: Mario Van Peebles in the lead role. I’m not entirely sure how this got into my Netflix queue. Perhaps it was the producer/screenplay credit to Richard Christian Matheson, whose writing I’ve admired for awhile now. Even so, I’m surprised this disc managed to float to the top of the queue. Seems like I’ve got a lot of stuff in there that should have been higher priority. Live, learn, and dish out one-star ratings. See if desperate

Review – Weekend at Bernie’s

I got a copy of this movie for free when I ordered a pizza. Really. No kidding. Andrew McCarthy stars in what has to be one of the dumbest caper movies of all time. Two snotty morons get caught up in a ridiculous set of circumstances that for one reason or another require them to keep up the pretense that their boss is hanging out with them at his beach house despite the fact that he’s been murdered by mobsters. That nothing they did would even remotely have worked is far beside the point, as is the number of opportunities they had to bail out of the whole mess with few if any repercussions. This is stupid even by 80s caper movie standards, so how or why on earth they ended up making as sequel is completely beyond me. In retrospect, the pizza came in a box. Maybe I should have watched that for 90 minutes instead. See if desperate

Review – Suspect Zero

I’ll bet these things sound great in the pitch meetings. A psychic who used to track serial killers for the FBI has gone crazy and is now hunting and killing the killers himself. We’ll get Ben Kingsley. What do you think? No, we swear we aren’t going to stir in a ton of incomprehensible subplots or use choppy editing and a muddled script to obscure the underlying story until it becomes difficult to care about. And we’d never dream of resorting to hackneyed visual tricks or anything like that. No, we don’t have our fingers crossed behind our backs. Please, just give us the money so we can start shooting. Mildly amusing

Review – Habitat

And you thought your teenage years were difficult. Imagine how much worse they would have been if the ozone layer was gone and your dad turned into a bizarre plant ghost. And then he takes your house and your mom with him into the realm of bizarre botany. If your imagination doesn’t stretch that far, then this movie might help you out. Otherwise it’s little more than an awful adolescent flick with some sci fi grafted on. Or is it the other way around? See if desperate

Review – The Quiet American (1958)

It’s almost hard to believe that Vietnam ever looked like this to American eyes. This first film production of Graham Greene’s novel suffers from many of the drawbacks of the 21st century remake while sporting few of the benefits. Production values are mid-range at best, the acting is mediocre and the script is terrible. But worst of all is Audie Murphy, playing the boyish-yet-sinister American agent with very little of the yet-sinister quality so essential to the story (but so unacceptable to late 50s audiences, one supposes). The result comes across almost entirely as a love triangle gone bad, robbing the production of the geopolitical elements that might have made it a much more interesting snapshot of western involvement in Indochina before it became the overwhelming mess of the 60s and 70s. Mildly amusing

Review – Charlie and the Chocolate Factory

I won’t bother comparing this to the original. Standing on its own, this is an exceptionally uneven production. The story works, but many of its elements do not. For example, the children’s characters (except Charlie, of course) were underdeveloped, while far too much time was spent on Willie Wonka. The premise of the tale is that Wonka is a magical creature, sort of an Eyrine for bad little kids and their even-worse parents. Such a figure doesn’t require an extended back story. The flashbacks to Wonka’s youth destroy the mystery that helps make him interesting, not to mention disrupting the flow of the picture. And Burton or Depp or whoever made the decision to play Wonka as Michael Jackson made a bad call, because it served only to make the character creepy – even somewhat disgusting – and drove a wedge between him and the audience who should probably sympathize with him at least a little. On the other hand, the movie had a lot of entertaining highlights as well. I was especially fond of Veruca falling victim to angry squirrels. As a concluding aside, I should note that somehow or another I let myself get talked into going to see this on opening night at the cramped, stuffy, and otherwise generally uncomfortable Southwind theaters in Lawrence, possibly the most unpleasant place and the worst possible time to see this or any other movie. I don’t think the awful surroundings hampered my appreciation of the movie, but viewing conditions didn’t exactly help either. Mildly amusing

Review – In the Realms of the Unreal

This is a fascinating look at the life and work of Henry Darger. Of course, with Darger as a subject you’d have to work pretty hard to make an uninteresting movie. And to be sure, there are a few rough spots. I’m not as big a fan as I thought I’d be of the decision to animate his drawings. On a more fundamental level, the background material – interviews with his neighbors and the like – didn’t amount to much beyond clearly establishing that nobody knew him especially well. With this in mind, most of the screen time goes to the artist’s work, particularly his legendary 15,000-page novel. It was enough to make me wish some visionary publishing house could find a way to print it, though it sounds like it would make difficult reading at best. As it stands, most of us will just have to be content with reproductions of his drawings and snippets of his writing. Worth seeing

Review – Maniac

Here’s a real cinema rarity: an interesting slasher movie. For the first half or so, this is as plotless and episodic as a porn movie. Indeed, it resembles cheap, low budget pornography a lot, except that the women are being murdered rather than screwed. The killer (Joe Spinnell in a fine performance) is a strong base of the Son of Sam (doubtless still fresh in the minds of most New Yorkers in 1980) mixed in with a cup of Ed Gein (the whole scalp-taking thing) and a dash of Zodiac (the desire to preserve victims as slaves). When the production starts sprouting a story, it’s almost a bit of a let-down. However, the end was genuinely impressive. Even all these years later, it’s still amazing what creativity can do for a low budget production. Worth seeing

Review – Dark Star

Here we have John Carpenter’s directorial debut, an odd low-budget effort from the late hippie days of 1974. I’ve been told by a couple of Navy vets that being shut up for a long time in the company of men actually is more than a little like this. That largely serves to make me grateful that I never had the experience myself. The atmosphere is good stuff, sort of a bridge between the clean technology of 2001 (which this picture at least in part parodies) and the grubby realms of future sci fi efforts crafted by Dan O’Bannon and Ron Cobb. The story, on the other hand, is uneven. Some of it is clever in a quirky sort of way. But most of it is more silly than anything else, such as the sequence in which O’Bannon spends 15 minutes battling a beach ball with feet. Overall this stirs up some nostalgia for sci fi con screenings back in the early 80s, but beyond that this is probably fairly missable. Mildly amusing

Review – Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1941)

I thought going into this that Spencer Tracy was an odd choice for the bifurcated antihero of this classic tale. But to his credit he does a solid job, only occasionally dipping into the ham on the Hyde side. Lana Turner and Ingrid Bergman do their parts to back him up as the good doctor’s intended and the brute’s lady-of-the-night victim respectively. But my favorite element of this production is the years-before-its-time portrayal of the psycho-sexual aspects of the warring personalities. Of particular note are the hallucination sequences that accompany Jekyll’s early transformations. Tracy frantically whipping two chariot-pulling horses that turn into bare (from shoulders up at least) Turner and Bergman … wow. Mildly amusing

Review – Don't Look Now

“Don’t Watch Ever” might have been better advice. This Nicholas Roeg supernatural thriller is one of those productions that would be really creepy if it was actually happening to you, but just watching it happen to fictional characters in a movie is merely dull. Donald Sutherland and Julie Christie play the parents of a little blonde girl who starts apparently appearing here and there in Venice despite having died some time earlier. Roeg manages to conjure an interesting visual here and there, but they’re no match for the weak script and wooden acting. The sex scene between the leads is especially horrific, easily qualifying as the least stimulating set of visuals since the horny hairy humpin’ hippies that grace the pages of The Joy of Sex. “Don’t look now” is some seriously good advice for that scene! Perhaps by 1973 standards this was an eerie bit of psychological horror, but now it rarely rises above boring. See if desperate

Review – Come and See

This is a hard movie to watch for a handful of reasons. It’s grim and depressing, though of course that’s exactly what you’d expect from a brutally accurate depiction of Nazi atrocities on the Eastern Front in 1943. Occasionally the flow falls victim to Socialist art school conceits. And why are Russian movies so hard on the cows? I think this is a tradition that dates back to Eisenstein’s Strike. No SPCA in the Soviet Union in 1985, I guess. But if you can get past the rough spots, this is an important production. When 30 million people die, someone ought to make a movie about it. And overall this one’s quite good. The nightmare of the village destruction sequence easily rivals anything from Hollywood holocaust movies. Worth seeing

Review – Assault on Precinct 13 (2004)

At least this didn’t turn out quite as bad as some other recent remakes. However, that’s at least in part because if you’re remaking The Manchurian Candidate you’ve got some serious living up to do. Redoing a mediocre offering from early in John Carpenter’s career, on the other hand, imposes less of a burden. Some of the new twists this time around actually help the plot. For example, in the original the attack by a gang took place in Los Angeles in clear weather. It’s easier to understand why nobody comes to the aid of a besieged police station in Detroit in the middle of a blinding snowstorm when the attacking forces turn out to be crooked cops (sorry about the minor spoiler, but it’s revealed early in the movie as well, not to mention on the DVD box). The acting is uneven, ranging from good work from Lawrence Fishburne to standard stuff from John Leguizamo to sub-par posturing from Ja Rule. Production values are good, and the story keeps moving fairly well. Mildly amusing

Review – White Noise

This whole thing reminds me of Jack Barth’s prank attempt to start a rumor that if you watch empty static on TV long enough occasionally the Virgin Mary will manifest herself across the vacant airwaves. The gag here is Electronic Voice Phenomenon, messages from ghosts rather than the Blessed Virgin, but the thought’s still pretty much the same. That spoiled at least the first third of the movie, because I kept expecting the EVP thing to turn out to be a scam, or better yet a scam that turns out to be real. I also had trouble suspending disbelief in visual manifestations. Audio I can imagine, but it was hard to get behind the notion that the dead can modulate their disembodied spirits to conform to NTSC standards. That aside, however, I guess the production has a few good moments. Of course it has a lot more moments in which characters – especially lead Michael Keaton – just sit around gawking at whatever is or isn’t happening on static-filled TV screens, or even what’s going on around them in the real world. Overall it’s a lot more wind-up than pitch. Mildly amusing

Review – No Way Out

I expect that objectively this is no better – in fact little different – from dozens of other espionage thrillers. But subjectively I like this one. I shouldn’t. Most of the back half of the movie dwells on the hero barely slipping out of a tedious parade of tight spots. The limo sex scene wasn’t terrible, but I didn’t find it as “inspirational” as some other folks did. The plot is one of those twisty-turny things that defies quick encapsulation, so suffice it to say that it involves an ambitious Navy officer, a sex triangle, and a lot of Washington intrigue. The end took me by surprise, which I found entertaining even though it didn’t add anything material to the plot. I liked the use of real D.C. area locations, but I probably could have done without Kevin Costner and Sean Young clogging them up with their “acting.” Overall this is more entertaining than enlightening, but that’s what you should probably expect from such an outing. Mildly amusing

Review – The Boogeyman

Ever since the first Halloween I’ve been waiting for KC and the Sunshine Band to show up on the soundtrack of a movie about the Boogeyman. Skunked again, I’m afraid. But that’s about all I’m afraid of in this tedious borefest about a guy still battling the childhood nightmare that snatched his father 15 years earlier. The filmmakers rely almost exclusively on those bone-jarring assaults of jump cuts that tear by at five or six frames per. The technique has been used to good effect elsewhere, but here there’s little in the way of plot or character to back it up. Compare this to that childhood classic, “The Golden Arm.” The arm works because it’s worked into a story and because the shock is only used once. Watching this movie was a little like spending 90 minutes being grabbed and having “You’ve got it!” shouted in my ear over and over. It gets old after awhile, especially with nothing else there to keep it interesting. See if desperate

Review – Batman Begins

Yeah, eventually. But he sure takes his time doing it. For the longest stretch at the beginning this movie does one of my least favorite tricks: ping-ponging back and forth between three or four different time frames. As much as I dislike this trick in general, my hat’s off for the effort to show not only the murders that first turned young Bruce Wayne against crime but also the trials and training that eventually turned him into a superhero. Once it settles down into a single stream, the plot becomes more of a straightforward good guys vs. bad guys story. This is also one of those productions that features a gaggle of big-name celebrities in supporting roles. But the best part for my money was that Batman was – at least in places – actually scary. This is the first, last and only Caped Crusader that ever left me believing that criminals would be afraid of him. I kinda hope they make a series out of this (when’s the last time you heard me say that about a movie?), but if they do I hope it doesn’t go downhill like the Tim Burton set did. Worth seeing

Review – Alone in the Dark (2005)

In the dark we may be, but alone we ain’t. We’re in here with quite the collection, including Pitch Black, Aliens, X Files, The Relic, The Keep, The Tingler … yes that’s right, The Tingler. Just think what a bargain it is to be able to see little Cliff’s Notes chunks of these and several other pictures all for the price of a single video rental. Everyone involved mails in their performances, even Tara Reid (proud recipient of the Denise Richards Nuclear Physicist award for her role as an archaeologist). The script and direction are weak, and the effects are one step (if that) above PlayStation graphics. Someday someone is going to make a really solid archaeology-based horror movie. Sadly, we’re apparently going to have to wait at least a little longer. At least this wasn’t as bad as the last video-game-based effort from Uwe “House of the Dead” Boll. Maybe next they’ll turn him loose on Frogger. See if desperate

Review – National Treasure

For a cheap (well okay, medium budget) knock-off of The DaVinci Code, this could have been a lot worse. Nicolas Cage was an odd pick for the role of treasure-hunting antiquities expert; he plays it a lot like his role in The Rock, and here it doesn’t work. I also think the writers could have worked a little harder to come up with some better twists or at least more obvious character motivations. But overall I had more fun with this than I did with the Dan Brown novel from which it’s pretty clearly stealing some thunder. Here some folks are making what everyone can clearly recognize as a silly caper movie about a vast trove of treasure, which for my taste is at least a step or two above doing the same thing with an important element of an important religion. Added surprise bonus: at least some elements are actually more historically accurate than Brown. Mildly amusing

Review – The Cockettes

Ah, what a magical time the late sixties and early seventies must have been in San Francisco. So magical, indeed, that apparently a number of the interviewees in this documentary don’t seem to remember things all that well. But that doesn’t stop this from being an interesting look at the birth, development and death of the Cockettes. To call the troupe a drag show would be selling it way short, as there was a measure of art and also some famous faces (Alan Ginsberg, Divine, Sylvester) making guest appearances along the way. I was surprised at how well-documented even the early days of the show turned out to be. Especially in the age before consumer video, it’s rare to find something this off-the-wall that has such an extensive visual record. And the footage sure helps, because watching what these folks were doing back in the day is a lot more interesting than listening to them reminisce about it now. If you’ve an interest in the subject or its setting, by all means give this movie a look. Mildly amusing

Review – Star Wars Episode Three: Revenge of the Sith

Well, at least now it’s over. This wasn’t a terrible movie, but it was sort of poorly put together. The biggest problem is that George Lucas (back in the director’s chair on top of being the idea guy for the franchise) is faced with the daunting task of tying up all the loose ends. How does the brooding teenager Anakin Skywalker turn evil enough to become Darth Vader by the end of this show? Unfortunately his conversion moves in a series of leaps, some of which aren’t all that convincing. Some of the technical stuff comes up short, too. For example, there’s a sequence early in the movie in which Natalie Portman just looks weird, like her makeup is messed up or the lighting is way off. Overall, however, this is an entertaining production. The effects are good. The story is appropriately murky (a little long on political intrigue, but perhaps that was unavoidable). And at the end of the series we arrive back at the beginning, sort of a Wagnerian twist. If I’d never seen any of the rest of them, I probably wouldn’t have thought much of this. But I’ve been watching these things for nearly three decades now. This episode supplies the closure we’ve all been waiting for at least since Phantom Menace. Mildly amusing

Review – Hellraiser: Deader

I never in a million years would have thought this series would make it to seven movies. Of course, to be fair they’re cheating a bit at this point. This is one of those sequels that looks a lot like it was originally written as something else and then had some of the franchise’s stock jim jams crammed in – probably largely to help it sell. Doug Bradley is back once again as the jim-jam-in-chief, putting in a couple of brief cameo-menaces of Kari Wuhrer (and whoever thought she’d be up to a lead role was mistaken). There are some trademark Barker-isms here and there (including a nod to  “Midnight Meat Train” that doesn’t fit the already-weak logic of the production). But for the most part this is warmed-over sins of the last two: cheap, fake, kinky sex mixed with meandering plot, all of which is ultimately killed by the use of so many is-this-reality fits and starts that it becomes impossible to care if we’re being lied to anymore. Despite all the screaming and bleeding and jump-cutting, at a couple of points I actually started to fall asleep. Toward the end it returned briefly to some of the charm of the original, but by then it wasn’t enough to justify the rest of the experience. Overall my hope still stands where it was after #4: that the series will finally prove to be not only merely dead but really most sincerely dead. See if desperate

Review – Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events

Cute kids. Clever premise. Nice supporting cast (with the exception of the always-frantically-overstated Jim Carry). But there’s just something here that isn’t quite working. For starters, if you want Tim Burton go ahead and pay for him. Further, don’t try to cram three books into one movie; the resulting plot will seem more than a little jumpy. In particular, a quick look at some of the deleted scenes and outtakes will reveal some spots where the story was supposed to have a bit more meat to it. Of course, they also reveal even more of Carry’s pesky antics. I haven’t read any of the books, but now I’m a little sorry that I didn’t start there instead of with the movie version. This production was a lot like trying to make a salad into a full meal. Mildly amusing

Review – Darkness

In the wake of The Ring I guess Hollywood has decided to let international directors run riot in the realm of the mid-budget ghost story. Trouble is, there’s more scary in the first ten minutes of The Ring (which itself wasn’t exactly a great paragon of the horror arts) than in the whole running time of this stinker. Indeed, the movie’s half over before anything happens that even appears to have been intended to be frightening, and even then it’s more annoying than anything else. What decent plot elements it picks up along the way are almost entirely “borrowed” from other movies such as The Amityville Horror. It picks up a teeny bit close to the end, but overall … well, one of the occult images associated with our family’s evil-possessed house is the ouroboros. Somehow the image of something biting itself in the ass is all too apt. See if desperate

Review – Days of Heaven

The visuals are the star of this Terrence Malik production. Richard Gere, Brooke Adams and Sam Shepard – all young in 1978 – turn in average performances. The passage from Genesis upon which this is loosely based is only ten verses long, and though things are fleshed out a bit with some soap opera twists and turns there still isn’t much of a story to speak of. The dialogue and narrative are also oddly cut, the plot spinning out in fits and starts. However, the look and feel are something else. The open plains of Texas in the late 19-teens give Malick plenty of opportunities to work with cinematography and art direction to produce something that, however dull, is very visually impressive. Mildly amusing

Review – Blade Trinity

Third verse, same as the first. New tricks this time around include a gaggle of gizmos ranging from anti-vampire viruses to iPods. Beyond product placement, however, this is more of that old, familiar, comic book plot and dialogue. If you liked the first two, odds are this one will have the same effect. If you didn’t like them, why are you still bothering with these things? Mildly amusing

Review – Something Wild

This 1986 opus from Jonathan Demme deserves prominent feature at any Midlife Crisis film festival, especially if shown as a double feature with Into the Night. But beyond that it’s a little hard to watch. Part of the problem crops up early on, when the protagonist (Jeff Daniels) comes across as sort of a dickhead. When we later learn that things aren’t exactly as they seem he’s partially redeemed, but it’s hard to get behind a guy who’s been less than likable for an hour or so. Beyond the weak story, there are a few small lures here and there. This is one of those productions that feature a lot of cameos, including John Sayles and John Waters within a couple of minutes of each other. Beyond that all you get is a small dose of clever, a good-sized pile of the 80s, and a whole lot of boring. See if desperate

Review – The Seven Samurai

If you see only one samurai movie, make this the one. It has everything: Akira Kurosawa at his finest behind the camera, Toshiro Mifune hamming it up in front of the camera, the running time, the shot composition, the zen philosophizing, and of course the swordfights. The only drawback is that it was shot in black and white (normally fine with me, but I’ve seen Kurosawa do some impressive stuff with color and have long wondered if he wouldn’t have preferred it here). Further, this tale of hired killers employed by villagers for protection against bandits has resurfaced in American pop culture again and again. I suppose it helps to have a taste for this kind of movie, but if this is the sort of thing you enjoy, then don’t miss this one. It’s the genre at its peak, and one of my favorite movies of all time. Caveat on the Criterion Collection DVD, however: it was telecined from a really inconsistent print. If it’s re-released in a cleaned-up version later, I’d definitely re-buy it. Buy the disc

Review – House of Wax (2005)

When Robert Zemeckis and some of his cronies first set out to remake all of William Castle’s movies, I was anxiously looking forward to the point when they got to The Tingler (one of my favorites). Now, unfortunately, I’m dreading the moment to the point that I hope it never comes. With each successive Dark Castle production (and for the record, they don’t appear to be unearthing William Castle corpses anymore), the acorns have fallen farther and farther from the tree. Indeed, this one must have been eaten by a squirrel and excreted in a neighboring state somewhere. For openers, the movie runs for nearly an hour before anyone gets killed. What kind of slasher movie is that? Next, even those of us who haven’t actively sought the experience have nonetheless already been confronted with multiple opportunities to see Paris Hilton undressed. With the money they spent getting her to once again peel off and prance around in her underwear, they might have been able to acquire assets ranging from a better screenplay or a more talented director (just how many ECUs can you wedge into one movie?) down to something as simple as a focus puller. And if you’re hoping somehow that the movie is cooking up some clever twists to add at least some entertainment value, hope no longer. Instead, try using a stopwatch so you can officially test how much screen time is devoted to planning sequences (“You go to the gas station and call for help while I check out the haunted house” “No, we should stick together” and blah blah blah). I’d try this experiment myself, but I don’t think I could sit through this thing again. Wish I’d skipped it