Review – Pumping Iron

For your entertainment dollar it’s hard to beat a 28-year-old Arnold Schwarzenegger talking about orgasms. Seriously, here’s the movie that brought body building into the spotlight and helped launch Arnold’s acting career. If you like muscle guys from the mid-70s, this is the flick for you. On the other hand, if you think the whole muscle obsession is kinda freakish, then for your taste this probably won’t amount to much more than a freak show. Mildly amusing

Review – Double Indemnity

This noir classic is very much a creature of its time. If nothing else, it’s hard to watch beloved TV dad and Disney regular Fred MacMurray playing a villainous anti-hero. Then there’s the dialogue, no doubt biting and innovative in 1944 but now more than a little cliché. But despite the dating, this is still an entertaining piece of movie-making. We all go into it knowing that the salesman and scheming woman plotting to murder her husband for insurance money are going to come to no good, especially when the plan becomes more complicated than necessary due to the need to kill hubby on a train in order to bring a double-indemnity clause into effect. But even the predictable outcome doesn’t detract from the pleasure of watching Edward G. Robinson as a claim investigator taking the scheme apart piece by piece. Worth seeing

Review – Bowling for Columbine

Michael Moore is mad, but he seems to be having some trouble figuring out exactly what he’s mad about or whom he’s mad at. Americans kill each other with guns, something that seems to peeve Moore to no end (as well it might). But he’s so excited about pinning this on large corporations that he shorts or bypasses altogether a lot of the root causes of violence. At least I didn’t hate this as much as I thought I was going to, except of course for the ambush nagging. And that brings me mindful of the “South Park” summary of American history, in particular the part that theorizes that early European immigrants shot the Indians due to fear, omitting the property aspects of Manifest Destiny. This inspired me to plan a documentary in which someone shows up unannounced at Moore’s home with a camera and a sad photo of Indian children, demanding that the Limbaugh of the Left deed his property over to the people from whom it was stolen. Mildly amusing

Review – Searching for Debra Winger

The concept had a lot of potential: famous Hollywood actresses – particularly though not universally those who at one time made their livings primarily off their looks – talk about the perils of getting old in an industry with little use for older actresses. Occasionally director Rosanna Arquette manages to get in a somewhat interesting discussion with someone like Frances MacDormand (ambushed in a bathroom during the Cannes Film Festival, no less) or get a worthwhile thought or two out of one-on-one or group chat. But for the most part these women are disappointingly insight-free. For openers, many of them communicate mostly in thick psycho-babble, suggesting that extensive therapy long ago rendered them incapable of genuine emotion or other mental processes. Even when valid points about balancing careers and family start to emerge, the wealth and fame factors rob the conversation of any sort of “washing the floors to send you to college” impact. And though Arquette asserts that Debra Winger’s decision to retire from the business served as the impetus for starting the project, she also appears to have been motivated at least in part by poorly-concealed jealousy of her younger sister’s success. Overall this isn’t bad. I just expected something better. Mildly amusing

Review – Cat People

Even all these years later it’s downright impressive what can be done with a decent script and a little careful attention to lighting and editing. Even the casting is good, using actors who fit their parts rather than big name stars. This particularly applies to Simone Simon, who really looks like a cat. In fact, she looks like a cute little kitten, which makes it all the more intriguing when it turns out that she’s got a dark, shape-shifting secret tied to her sexuality. Though I guess it was only natural that this movie got lost in overall events in 1942, it now deserves a place in horror movie history. A must-see for any fan of the genre. Worth seeing

Review – Frazetta: Painting with Fire

If you’re a big – or even moderate – fan of Frank Frazetta, you should get a real kick out of this production. It comes across as a bit random, moving from topic to topic in an episodic but somewhat disorganized manner. Even so, it’s fairly comprehensive and occasionally insightful, despite the emphasis on interviews with artists, film-makers and other folks who would apparently prefer to heap praise on the subject rather than sharing anything interesting about him. Mildly amusing

Review – Goya in Bordeaux

I should start by admitting that I dozed through part of this movie. But I think I got enough of the general gist of things to form an opinion about the overall quality of the work. Here we have Goya’s life retold through theatrically-staged flashbacks as the old guy slowly dies in exile in France. I liked the attempts to make the flashbacks resemble the artist’s work, especially when the filmmakers actually manage to pull it off. However, the production tends throughout to strongly resemble a stage play, giving it the distinct flavor of the movie Paul Schrader made many years ago about Yukio Mishima. In Schrader’s case the look-and-feel was justified, as his subject was – among other things – a playwright. But here I was hoping for something a little more painterly and a little less stagy. Mildly amusing

Review – Luther

Thrivent Financial for Lutherans presents an exceptionally one-sided account of the great reformer’s life. Obviously it’s understandable that they’d want to praise the founder of their church and one of the key figures in early Protestantism. Further, this is an easy-to-watch account of his life, hitting the important points and keeping things both interesting and clean enough for the church crowd. Joseph Fiennes does a good job in the title role, helping the character come across as both important and human at the same time. However, the uncritical nature of the narrative at times borders on downright inaccurate. For example, the success of Luther’s rebellion against the Catholic Church is portrayed in almost exclusively theological terms, with little or no attention paid to the politics behind the resistance of German princes to Papal authority. Mildly amusing

Review – Legend of the Bog

Four threads vie for the title of “least interesting” in this weak tale of a reanimated corpse that emerges from an Irish bog, makes a couple of dogs into shoes and goes on a killing spree. At first his violence seems random, but then the true motive emerges and makes us all long for the time when we didn’t know the monster’s ridiculous reason for his foul deeds. On the other hand, this is about as good as we have any right to expect from a cast populated with so many former soccer players. Also released as Bog Body. Wish I’d skipped it

Review – Elektra

I guess it’s possible that if you find Jennifer Garner talented and/or alluring, there’s a chance you’ll get a kick out of this production. Though previously unfamiliar with her work (aside from Daredevil, which might best go unconsidered here), I was prepared to give her the benefit of the doubt. She came up well short, her acting downright robotic and her appearance nowhere near fetching enough to make up for her stiff performance. The script didn’t help matters any. Of all the comic books Marvel has turned into movies recently, only The Hulk had a story this uninteresting. My particular favorite part was the villain who could make his extensive collection of animal tattoos come to life and attack people. The character’s name? Tattoo. Sadly most of the rest of the show is on par with this for creativity and entertainment value. See if desperate

Review – The Phantom of the Opera (2005)

At long last the ever-popular Sir Andrew Lloyd Webber musical version of the Gaston Leroux classic (discounting Webber’s decision to give himself credit for writing the story when the play first hit Broadway) makes it to the silver screen. The production design is close enough to Moulin Rouge that it should leave Baz Luhrman feeling flattered or ripped off or both. Beyond that, however, this is almost pure Webber ego. The plot retains a few fragments of the novel’s gothic charm, but it’s almost completely buried under a thick blanket of repetitive, go-nowhere musical numbers. The casting was odd, too. Minnie Driver does an entertaining job as Carlotta, and Miranda Richardson turns in a solid, quiet performance as the Phantom’s semi-sidekick. But beyond that most of the players are quasi-knowns and new faces, disappointing in roles where a little star power would have been a real plus. My biggest gripe, however, is that every time the movie appears to be in danger of becoming interesting it immediately dives back into an extended yodeling session about love or darkness or music or love of dark music. Honestly, big chunks of this thing were as boring as real opera. Mildly amusing

Review – Quiz Show

Good cast. Decent script. Decent production values and direction. Ralph Fiennes in particular does a solid job as poor, tortured Charles Van Doren, eye of the storm during the quiz show scandal that at least partially changed the face of television. And that’s where the show goes wrong. There’s very little perspective offered on the real scope of what happened. In its early years people accorded television a great deal of importance. The rigging of quiz shows really injured the faith of a lot of consumers of this new technology, and it helped steer the medium away from its full potential and transform it into an entertainment-oriented industry. This thought is reflected strongly at the end, but without the proper historical perspective it’s hard to really appreciate. Thus in my opinion the best moment in the movie is the conversation between Herb Stempel and his wife right after she finds out that he was getting the answers. Only there do we truly glimpse the impact of the whole mess. Mildly amusing

Review – Judgment at Nuremberg

Here’s an odd corner of post-World-War-Two victor’s justice: the trial of German judges accused of cooperating with the Nazis’ crimes against humanity. The ensemble cast (including Spencer Tracy as the lead American judge and Burt Lancaster as the lead defendant) does a great job with the theatrical script. Though the production values make it look a little like an old, black and white, made for TV movie, it nonetheless deserves a place among Hollywood’s best courtroom dramas. Worth seeing

Review – The Aviator

All by himself, Howard Hughes almost automatically makes for the subject of an interesting movie. But Martin Scorsese appears to be doing almost everything he can to avoid pulling it off. For openers, he seems to have lost a good deal of his once-impressive sense of timing. As a result, many sequences that I’m sure were intended as a glimpse into Hughes’s manias instead come across as little more than annoying. Further, much of the casting here is all wrong. Leonardo DiCaprio does an acceptable job as the young, enthusiastic protagonist, but by the time 20 years and the strain of mental illness are supposed to have taken their toll on him, the actor no longer has the range to pull it off. And don’t even get me started on Kate Blanchett as Katherine Hepburn. Overall this is a long, expensive production that isn’t bad but could have been a lot better than it was. Mildly amusing

Review – Schindler’s List

Steven Spielberg sends a clear message to the world: “Don’t you dare not give me an Oscar this time.” In Big Steve’s defense, this actually is a fairly good movie. The black and white is a little pretentious, and if it were possible to over-dramatize the Holocaust this movie would certainly be in the running to do it. The movie’s running time is so immense that it actually took two DVDs to get it all in. And I guess it goes without saying that any story in which potential victims are rescued from the Final Solution is going to almost automatically win the Anne Frank Only with a Happy Ending Award as well. All that notwithstanding, the bittersweet tale of the Schindler Jews makes for a fine movie. Worth seeing

Review – Zombie Flesh Eaters

I think they should make a movie called Zombie Beefeaters in which the reanimated corpses of guards at the Tower of London chase brainless bikini models around for an hour and a half. Hey, it wouldn’t be any dumber than what this movie turned out to be. Indeed, with less guards and more denizens of some kind of ghost ship, that’s exactly what you’ve got here. See if desperate

Review – Raid on Entebbe

I loved this movie when I first saw it, the first time it aired or thereabouts. I wanted to grow up to be the James Woods character, the guy who gets the call when things go bad, tosses an Uzi in his suitcase, and goes to work. The whole thing has a strong pro-Israeli slant, but at least in this case they were the good guys, so that’s okay. Some of the action sequences aren’t too shabby, and Yaphet Kotto as Idi Amin isn’t to be missed. The rest of the cast includes a parade of familiar faces such as Peter Finch and Charles Bronson. Beyond that, however, this has a strong made-for-TV flavor. Mildly amusing

Review – Confessions of Robert Crumb

Proof – as if it was really necessary – that artists don’t always make the best film-makers, particularly not with themselves as their subjects. Crumb’s rather brief autobiographical piece has some interesting footage but sheds little worthwhile light on his life or work. Further, he comes off looking like kind of a creep. Accurate though that might be, he’s a lot more fun when he communicates with his drawings rather than his mouth. Mildly amusing

Review – General Idi Amin Dada

Barbet Schroeder takes on one of the most notorious dictators of the second half of the 20th century and – with his more-or-less-full cooperation – makes a documentary about him. The result is more than a little creepy as Amin swaggers around Uganda doing the whole tyrant thing. Of particular interest are the sequences in which he directs a military exercise in which his troops train to attack the Golan Heights and the cabinet meeting during which he drones on and on, briefly berating a minister who later turned up dead. This is about half a decade before Amin was deposed and fled for his life. Indeed, this is even before the raid on Entebbe, so we see him at the height of his power. At times he seems jovial, almost goofy. But then the bad craziness comes out again. Fascinating stuff. Worth seeing

Review – The Jerk

In the pantheon of deliberately stupid comedies, this one holds an exalted seat. Certainly to an extent it’s the creature of a more naïve time, depending heavily on Steve Martin’s unique late-70s comedy style. But I still remember laughing my ass off when I first saw this in a theater back in 1979. I was a little easier to amuse back then, so there’s a chance that I like this more than I really should because of fond memories. That notwithstanding, at least some parts of the tale of mentally-atypical Nathan Johnson’s rise to fame and fall from same manages to be funny, sometimes even clever. So if you can get past the dated material – and the presence of Jackie Mason early on – you should enjoy the experience. Mildly amusing

Review – Our Daily Bread

Ever wonder what it would have been like if the wide-eyed, corny world of Hollywood in the 1930s used its unique brand of happy jingoism to promote cooperative farming? Well, if that itch ever does take you, King Vidor will help you scratch it. In the depths of the Great Depression a motley crew of the unemployed masses get together and start working for themselves rather than The Man. The cast of characters comes complete with a too-good-to-be-true hero and heroine, a con with a heart of gold and a Jezebel who tries to corrupt our naïve protagonist. I kept expecting someone to shout something like “Hey everyone, let’s put on a commune!” And some of the dialogue came darn close. The DVD comes with a set of Roosevelt-era documentaries, including two person-on-the-street interviews designed to help defeat Upton Sinclair’s bid to be California’s governor (who said “fair and balanced” started with Rupert Murdoch?) and on the other side of things a handful of shorts produced to sell various New Deal programs. Mildly amusing

Review – The 7th Voyage of Sinbad

Actually this is the first, or at least the first one the legendary sailor took courtesy of Ray Harryhausen. And as would come to be the pattern with Dynamation features, the monsters steal the show. Indeed, in this effort the plot and characters are almost completely irrelevant. We even re-encounter a couple of these early Harryhausen efforts in later movies, particularly the sword-fighting skeleton. Even though some of the stop motion is a little rough, it’s still good stuff. Mildly amusing

Review – Zombie Hell House

So is there some kind of export regulation that requires all Lucio Fulci movies to have the word “zombie” in the title? I guess there’s a zombie creeping around here someplace, but he doesn’t really show up until the end. Most of the rest of the picture plays like an uneven mix of ghost story and slasher movie. Fans of Fulci gore will find a typical but small smattering of it here. Unfortunately, that’s about the only thing this production has going for it. I like bats, so the scene with the bat would have been enough to demote the movie if it hadn’t already firmly seated itself in the basement. And if that wasn’t enough, the last ten to fifteen minutes of the movie is nothing but screaming, shrieking and then more screaming. Honestly, it gave me a headache. I’ve also seen this released as The House by the Cemetery, a slightly more apt title. Wish I’d skipped it

Review – Hans Christian Anderson

On the surface the role of one of the great spinners of children’s stories seems like a natural fit with Danny Kaye. When I was a kid I loved listening to a record of Kaye reading Andersen’s stories, so even as an adult I remained more than ready to accept him in the part. The trouble is that it turns out to be a really odd role in a really odd musical. When the protagonist is being clever and telling silly stories to kids, the movie’s charming in a 50s-era juvenile musical kind of a way. However, once the action moves to Copenhagen and gets caught up with the Danish Ballet, the story turns strange. The long dance sequences are more than most kids can reasonably be expected to sit through. And even worse, our hero develops a fixation on the (married) prima ballerina, an affection that at the time of the movie’s original release might have been described as “lovelorn” but now merely evokes the word “stalker.” In short, it’s got too much silly kids’ stuff for most adults and too much arty ballet crap for most kids. Mildly amusing

Review – I’m All Right Jack

Though he plays a supporting role, Peter Sellers steals the show in this late-50s British comedy about labor unrest. Sellers plays the union boss at a missile factory where a relative of one of the owners has just gone to work as a forklift driver. High jinks ensue. This is very much a creature of its time, infested throughout with the very English humor of the post-war period. Even so, much of it is funny, sometimes even downright clever. However, I should admit on a personal note that this review is based on a re-watch (I first saw it many years ago when I was just a kid) that came on the heels of a two-year stint as a union president, so I might have enjoyed it a bit more than I would have otherwise just because I recognized a lot of the situations and personalities from my own personal experiences. Mildly amusing