tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24518381839108644052024-03-17T19:59:08.705-07:00CinemaphileMovie reviews and commentary from online film critic David Keyes.David M Keyeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11765191637815775830noreply@blogger.comBlogger951125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2451838183910864405.post-41558520185548577232023-09-01T12:06:00.001-07:002023-09-01T12:06:09.234-07:00Suspiria / **** (1977)<div style="text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi3LFowLg8teCPI5tjed3MNck-GNENhTyHnwD8wTnF5DKwJqKHMcyXA-sCSZeuwnwOMzMnXlC9KPoamME2l6YY5nQoTcPrxX6dqTbl4yI_WgztWj0HQzDSr5R58cuX6p8NpcG8c1YNcWfjOTWRc0MmTWr8VIZmMv39gUu2YhXamhJEutck6XFcYEr4JwO8T/s656/3yq85djfvwv11.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="343" data-original-width="656" height="209" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi3LFowLg8teCPI5tjed3MNck-GNENhTyHnwD8wTnF5DKwJqKHMcyXA-sCSZeuwnwOMzMnXlC9KPoamME2l6YY5nQoTcPrxX6dqTbl4yI_WgztWj0HQzDSr5R58cuX6p8NpcG8c1YNcWfjOTWRc0MmTWr8VIZmMv39gUu2YhXamhJEutck6XFcYEr4JwO8T/w400-h209/3yq85djfvwv11.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>The first thing to assault us is the music. A haunting, odd melodic blend of low menacing synths underneath joyful chimes harkens the memory to the days of sinister fairy tales, when beautiful maidens wandered aimlessly through a world quietly plotting to end them. Almost on cue, the chime is followed by the arrival of attractive Suzy Bannion (Jessica Harper), who wanders an airport terminal after a long flight overseas brings her to Italy. Notice the space between her and the glass doors of the exit briefly seems exaggerated, as if they are moving away with each step. When the doors close, the musical chords drop to total silence. She moves in, now faster and with more determination, until they open, allowing the chime to begin again as she finally crosses the threshold into the stormy night. The music overwhelms her, as if it were not music at all, but a sonic enchantment transporting her out of the safety of one world for the uncertainty of the next. For Dario Argento, the enamored filmmaker, this is merely an overture in a decadent urban retelling of Snow White. But for the many admirers (and curious onlookers) of the great “Suspiria,” it is the first of many important moments in the most visually striking horror film they may ever see.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><span><a name='more'></a></span><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">On the surface the film is about Suzy the talented ballet student, coming from abroad to study at the famed Tanz Akademie in order to ascend her skills. Underneath it is a ghoulish fable, about a naïve girl who wanders into a world she thinks she understands and is casually swept up into its strange and inexplicable realities. All the clues pointing to something diabolical are there, but her sense of practicality only creates logical suspicions. When she arrives at the school in the dead of night, just in time to spy the flight of one of its panic-stricken students into the shadows of a nearby forest, she doesn’t assume anything otherworldly – only the sense that she might be running from anger or argument. How unfortunate for her that she doesn’t witness the next several minutes of the girl’s plight as she escapes into a building to seek shelter with a friend, only to be attacked (and murdered) in a grizzly show of vibrant pageantry by an unknown assailant who is able to reach her from the vantage point of a high-rise window.</div><div><br /></div><div>Suzy’s orientation into the school presses on, even as peers and instructors whisper in corners or shoot gazes of suspicion at one another in the aftermath of the murder. Her trust, at least, is guarded, especially given two odd extremes on staff: Madame Blanc (Joan Bennet), the headmistress, a stuffy sort who seems to dress for high-brow socialite gatherings instead of school activities, and Miss Tanner (Alida Valli), a disciplinarian with the precision and temperament of a drill instructor. Blanc is formal and courteous enough on her first meetings with the new American student, but Tanner detects her strong will – first seeing it as a source of fascination, and then later as a liability that must be chipped away. Their iron rule is contrasted by the more relaxed temperament of the dancers, including Olga (Barbara Magnolfi), a third-year student who dismisses the dead girl as a troublemaker, and Sara (Stefania Casini), who believes there is much more to the story of her demise than just a randomized attack.</div><div><br /></div><div>The gruesome murder of the early scenes frames the mystery of the film as a whole. Something powerful, enigmatic or, at the very least, ulterior is occurring within the labyrinth of halls and open spaces that make up the school’s interior, with Suzy – a watchful outsider and then a guarded sleuth – absorbing details with the practicality of a person not yet compromised by the logical gaps associated with the experience. When she overhears Madame Blanc feign ignorance about what exactly caused poor Pat Hingle to flee into the night to local authorities, she interjects to inform them of all that she saw upon her arrival, including the movement of the girl’s lips, which suggests she was speaking to someone in the doorway just before departing. Blanc concedes the detail might be valuable to the police, but her cold gaze underscores another possibility: that perhaps Suzy Bannion knows more than she should, and could prove a hindrance in whatever secrets the school holds.</div><div><br /></div><div>The theory is all but validated by the events that come right after. When Blanc clears a room in the school for Suzy to take up residence in after she has moved in with Olga off-campus, her refusal is met with annoyance, just before she shows up in Tanner’s class and falls ill in the middle of her first recital. When she awakens, she is sentenced to bed rest by the school doctor, her belongings conveniently moved back into the dormitory. Later, following a series of exchanges with Sara regarding the whereabouts of the staff in the late hours of evening, a maggot infestation from the ceiling forces them all to sleep downstairs – in the open and without privacy. The blind piano teacher, who speaks of his loyal guide dog with the utmost glee, causes a more prominent break in the narrative’s momentum: when the dog attacks Madame Blanc’s nephew and mauls him outside, he is angrily banished from the school, where he drinks his sorrows away at a local bar just before wandering foolishly into an empty town square in the dead of night. And then the music returns to help the unseen villain take another casualty.</div><div><br /></div><div>Ordinary movies might be weighed down by logical improbabilities. Argento embraces them as part of an elabrate descent into a macabre visual surrealism. Every detail, every shot drips with sumptuous excess, down to velvet patterns on the walls of hallways to the gold-leaf framing that surrounds doorways or important passages. This is not a literal world in the sense of a specific era or place, but a heightened dream-like one where flesh and blood individuals are subjected to all the rules of ordinary characters – including the manner that they may fall victim to the horrendous carvings of a straight razor. That gives the material a rather disarming quality, particularly when it comes to the violence. Attacks are facilitated like ballet dances with death. Blood pours from wounds with agonizing emphasis. An exposed beating heart is stabbed in shocking close-up. All of this is done under the rich blanket of three-strip technicolor, an old process that was nearly extinct by the time Argento came around to it; color saturation on the print is so vivid, so prominent, that it elevates the material into something more than just a show of actions or exchanges. Apply this logic to the critical scene of Sara running from an attacker after she and a drugged Suzy have deduced the staff must be walking towards a secret passage at night instead of the front exit – when she crawls through a window into a room she thinks will provide her escape, she falls into a pit of razor wire, where a struggle under a deep blue light ensues. Would the scene play as painfully, or with such a visceral sting, if it had been done without the kaleidoscopic color palette?</div><div><br /></div><div>If the aesthetic is key to the experience of the film, so is the music. Composed by Italian band Goblin, the score is a harsh and bloodcurdling blend of childlike innocence and adult menace, heightened by a supernatural energy that underlines it as a whole (notice how the darker pieces seem to be accompanied by a low demonic whisper). Their strategy provides the film with all its key emotional cues; when a particular piece begins playing over the speakers, it signals one of several notable events, ranging from ensuing chases, important discoveries, chance encounters and, finally, to the bloody murders themselves, which seem purposely prolonged in order to let the music finish. Combined, they are movements in a visual symphony of terror. Little wonder, then, the band remains so closely associated with the material even as the years pass along, and when a remake of the movie was nearing release in 2018, the popularity of the original soundtrack inspired the band to tour with it all over again, well over 40 years after it first ingrained itself into the horror movie zeitgeist.</div><div><br /></div><div>Dario Argento, of course, was no stranger to that status. One of the principal architects of the technical excess that became synonymous with the “Giallo” label, his early films were celebrated equally for their texture as their compelling narratives. The greatest film of his early career is “The Bird with the Crystal Plumage,” a murder mystery set in Rome, although a case could also be made for the wildly popular “Deep Red,” about the killing of a psychic; that film’s own striking color palette is like watching “Suspiria” in embryo. He would replicate the savory blend of deep color saturation with strategic murder fantasies in a handful of films scattered across the 80s as well – none more effective than “Opera,” containing the famous shot of a bound and gagged opera singer forced to watch the slaughter of her peers while a row of needles hold her eyelids open. In another form, perhaps a more grounded or pragmatic one, subject matter this extreme would be too gruesome to reason with. Under the lens of Giallo’s arresting visual fantasy, it becomes captivating performance art. </div><div><br /></div><div>Written by DAVID KEYES</div><div><br /></div><div><div>Horror/Fantasy (Italy); 1977; Rated R; Running Time: 92 Minutes</div><div><br /></div><div>Cast:</div><div>Jessica Harper: Suzy Bannion</div><div>Stefania Casini: Sara</div><div>Joan Bennett: Madame Blanc</div><div>Alida Valli: Miss Tanner</div><div>Flavio Bucci: Daniel</div><div>Barbara Magnolfi: Olga</div><div>Udo Kier: Dr. Frank Mandel</div><div><br /></div><div>Produced by Claudio and Salvatore Argento; Directed by Dario Argento; Written by Dario Argento and Daria Nicolodi; based on the book “Suspiria de Profundis” by Thomas De Quincey</div></div>David Keyeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03067794906887523107noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2451838183910864405.post-38794942486766394562023-08-30T19:26:00.000-07:002023-08-30T19:26:01.254-07:00An American Werewolf in London / ***1/2 (1981)<div style="text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEifYE7URDuLImFlJA-shwHorV0AJX4lTAi5bbUQzNEbKAlEIAll91RCqfQ-geh7bPHfGJ8VFXA_ll1hCJbUdZC7qnRMOvpuwZr5Uf8KkZJC4In7Hqu2uiYRS55j8zSaAAZk-2mEvMQaP-xRpzcFJQHS6mttIcp3lCzR04MEz25ToRcLZqJry2I2OXDRASyz/s500/MV5BMTgyNTg4MzgzNl5BMl5BanBnXkFtZTcwODEwMTUzNw@@._V1_.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="326" data-original-width="500" height="261" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEifYE7URDuLImFlJA-shwHorV0AJX4lTAi5bbUQzNEbKAlEIAll91RCqfQ-geh7bPHfGJ8VFXA_ll1hCJbUdZC7qnRMOvpuwZr5Uf8KkZJC4In7Hqu2uiYRS55j8zSaAAZk-2mEvMQaP-xRpzcFJQHS6mttIcp3lCzR04MEz25ToRcLZqJry2I2OXDRASyz/w400-h261/MV5BMTgyNTg4MzgzNl5BMl5BanBnXkFtZTcwODEwMTUzNw@@._V1_.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>Werewolves were hardly a fresh idea when John Landis helmed his mega-influential “An American Werewolf in London,” but it was one of the only movies of the modern era to do a faithful call-back to George Waggner’s “The Wolf Man,” the first picture to ever show the carnal transformation of a man into a bloodthirsty creature. Like that famed identity from the 30s, the villain in Landis’ outing is not an unknown source: it is the cursed alter ego of the protagonist, who undergoes the painful transformation as a result of a near-fatal encounter in the early scenes. “Beware the moon, lads,” a bar patron at a local pub ominously warns two Americans as they prepare to continue their hike through the Yorkshire countryside. Walking silently among rural shadows, a howl in the distance begins to sound. It moves in – closer and closer, until a violent attack ensues and one of them is killed. Gunshots ring out just as the second is mauled, but he survives. And so begins another glimpse into the world of the mythical lycanthrope, told from the rare perspective of a man who walks around knowing what he carries, but is uncertain about what it might cost him until far too late.<span><a name='more'></a></span><br /><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">When the movie arrived to accolades and cheers in the summer of 1981, it represented a series of noteworthy firsts. It was Landis’ first foray into horror, directly following the highly lauded “Animal House.” It was the first full-length film Griffin Dunne ever starred in. It was the single picture whose special effects directly inspired Michael Jackson’s video for “Thriller,” often seen as the first great work of art of the medium. And it was the first movie to ever win the Best Makeup award at the Academy Awards, a category created specifically to honor a new field of emerging artists tasked with the transformation of the human face. Indeed, whenever the film comes up in conversation, the first verbal acknowledgment usually deals with its most spectacular sequence: a long and grueling passage when we see the hero David (David Naughton) scream in pain as his body morphs from that of a handsome young man into a ravenous, ferocious creature with razor fangs and horrifying eyes. Not content to just visualize the moment, Landis does an even more audacious thing: he allows it all to occur under light, so that no detail is left to the imagination. Think of how brave, how fearless a filmmaker had to be in those early years of risky anomalies, and you get a sense of the creative chutzpah that drives the picture as a whole.</div><div><br /></div><div>A handful of solid entertainments about werewolves came out of the genre’s most prolific decade, including “The Howling” and “Silver Bullet,” but it is “An American Werewolf in London” that still resonates the most – perhaps because it seems as fresh and savvy today as it must have been when audiences first set eyes upon the material. No matter how many times it comes to the screen, no matter how thorough we might memorize all the triggers that lead into the scenes of terror, the sheer gusto of ambition in each frame still manage to catch us off-guard. Think back to the first time you saw David Kessler sitting passively in that chair, keeping his mind and eyes busy in a book, when the camera zooms in and he begins to scream under the full moon. Are any of us ever prepared to endure the next two minutes as he contorts, mutates and shifts from one physical form to the other? It is one of the single most powerful moments in the history of the genre, ranking up there with the demon’s projectile vomiting in “The Exorcist” and the fatal shower scene of “Psycho.”</div><div><br /></div><div>Also like many of the greatest of horror films, Landis’ pitch is enhanced by how well he foreshadows the climactic reveals. The movie opens passively enough, as two backpackers – David Kessler (Naughton) and Jack Goodman (Dunne) – come to the first signs of civilization on a meandering journey through England, having arrived there after an afternoon of hitchhiking. Their destination is inconsequential as their dialogue revolves around affairs back home, and soon they have stumbled upon The Slaughtered Lamb, one of those shabby British pubs that contain all the familiar staples: an audience of downturned eyes, awkward silence, suspicious glances and short, succinct warnings. One of them notices a pentacle painted on the wall behind the bar, framed by two burning candles, and when Jack asks about its meaning, the others instantly go rigid: they have touched on the forbidden legend of the small rural village. It is one they will soon confront as they are chased out of the bar of strangers and into the menacing claws of nightfall.</div><div><br /></div><div>The movie centers primarily on David in the weeks following his survival. Waking in a London hospital bed weeks after the ordeal with foggy recollections of that night, he is plagued by guilt following the revelations of Dr. Hirsch (John Woodvine), who reminds him that Jack perished because of his injuries. The locals claim it was a madman who attacked him, but David’s recollections – not to mention the scars on his chest – paint a different portrait. The kindly Nurse Price (Jenny Agutter) lingers bedside while he works through the trauma, but is mystified by behaviors that don’t seem as if they belong to an ordinary 20-something. He does not eat. He dreams that he is running through a forest in the nude, as if on the hunt for a kill. An image of him with yellow eyes and sharp teeth flashes on screen right after a shot of him devouring the meat off a dear carcass. Then, much to his amazement, his deceased friend appears as a mangled apparition in the hospital room, long enough to divulge the fate of his character should he not kill himself before the next full moon. It goes to emphasize Landis’ wry humor that Jack’s talking corpse gets progressively more grotesque as the movie continues, until all that is left in his final encounter with David is a skeletal face awkwardly chattering away in the back row of a movie theater.</div><div><br /></div><div>During his initial recovery, David finds comfort in the company of the beautiful nurse. She takes a liking to him as well, surmising that all his quirks and wild claims are simply the act of a man who can’t come right out and indicate his attraction. She takes the reins without much hesitation: when he is discharged from the hospital and it is clear he has nowhere to go, she offers him a temporary stay in her flat nearby. That is not something Dr. Hirsch approves of, but moreso since he starts to suspect validity to the wild claims of an animal attack. Later, when he sets off to investigate the matter in the same pub where it all began, he finds most of the patrons to be rigid and well-guarded on the matter. “It was just an escaped lunatic!” one of them announces in a dismissive tone. The doctor is given no time to contemplate the matter; outside, an uneasy dart player from the bar takes him aside to reveal the local legend of the werewolf, which has now attached itself to the American man loose on the streets in London.</div><div><br /></div><div>If David Kessler was totally dismissive of his plight or careless with the curse itself, that would be one thing. If he does not pay much heed to the matter during the early warnings, it’s because he can’t be sure if the information is legitimate, or if it’s just his traumatized mind manufacturing a far-fetched fantasy. When the first transformation happens, in fact, he doesn’t even remember it happening on the following morning – this despite him waking up nude in a zoo cage of wolves, with no recollection of how he got there. Nurse Price doesn’t believe it at first either, even though she leaves him home during a shift at the hospital and returns in the dead of night to discover he is nowhere to be found. Hirsch is also apprehensive, even after being offered the explanation in the country, until the news reports of half a dozen shredded human bodies from the night before begin to dominate the conversation. By the time all the realizations come to a head in the minds of the key parties, the movie has written itself into a corner that most directors would find too frustrating or challenging to pull off. But Landis, a pro on the matter of his narrative intersections, crafts an exciting third act that allows all those threads to come together plausibly, in a showdown on the streets of London that is as exciting as it is skillful and concise.</div><div><br /></div><div>Although the movie is over 40 years old, somehow it still pulsates with resilient life on screen. That’s because Landis, his makeup artists, his visual effects wizards and his actors are so strikingly ferocious in their delivery. They don’t exaggerate the obvious absurdity of the idea, instead choosing to glimpse it through eyes that are deadpan and sincere. They don’t stuff the plot full of self-awareness or convoluted explanations. What they care about is the visceral experience. To them, it matters not that poor David is so oblivious of his mistakes. Perhaps there would be no story here if he chose to seriously heed Jack’s ghostly warnings. But because he feels so much more likable and accessible compared to so many other horror film anti-heroes, he is much more than just a walking dichotomy. When the wild and untamed werewolf is cornered in a dark alley after a night of insatiable bloodlust in the film’s final moments, some part of us still wants to hold back – as if to hope the man beneath the transformation still can see enough reason to be salvaged from the evil curse on his body.</div><div><br /></div><div>Written by DAVID KEYES</div><div><br /></div><div><div>Horror/Comedy (US/UK); 1981; Rated R; Running Time: 97 Minutes</div><div><br /></div><div>Cast:</div><div>David Naughton: David Kessler</div><div>Jenny Agutter: Nurse Alex Price</div><div>Griffin Dunne: Jack Goodman</div><div>John Woodvine: Dr. Hirsch</div><div>Fran Oz: Mr. Collins</div><div><br /></div><div>Produced by George Folsey Jr., Peter Guber and Jon Peters; Directed and written by John Landis</div></div>David Keyeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03067794906887523107noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2451838183910864405.post-10625845942689263402023-08-24T17:41:00.000-07:002023-08-24T17:41:07.028-07:00Lessons from Criterion: "Night of the Living Dead" by George A. Romero<div style="text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg9yfMQnDiVG8WQxg_KR29NL2m0xb83ciHcDK-0iLXbXga_0sb9aBneQUmfy86mO0IEu48yFbwrIjDFon9SlSRejki6lwOPvdG6a-C9M3qVTx4FcmlhFBOTyP-eQJdYPSmWecY-AOFT3_L3QiuaLtFVe5k3reIpbC7M9WQl6i2DQ4xr2pooKuIh9Lz-xd79/s800/image-w1280.webp" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="450" data-original-width="800" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg9yfMQnDiVG8WQxg_KR29NL2m0xb83ciHcDK-0iLXbXga_0sb9aBneQUmfy86mO0IEu48yFbwrIjDFon9SlSRejki6lwOPvdG6a-C9M3qVTx4FcmlhFBOTyP-eQJdYPSmWecY-AOFT3_L3QiuaLtFVe5k3reIpbC7M9WQl6i2DQ4xr2pooKuIh9Lz-xd79/w400-h225/image-w1280.webp" width="400" /></a></div>What a strange and surreal experience it can be to look upon George Romero’s “Night of the Living Dead” in the here and now, so long after zombie culture has ingrained itself firmly in our minds and our sense of cynicism has caught up to its underlying influence. All the obligatory questions emerge before a single frame has transpired. What does a dated relic from the era of indie counter-culture have to offer us now? Aren’t we too desensitized to be shocked or dismayed? Does any of the material on screen resonate in any way, especially given how effortlessly its grim sensibilities have been upstaged by dozens of indirect remakes, sequels and modern interpretations through the years? In almost every conversation about the most prolific of horror sub-genres, the popular benchmark is usually spoken of in only passively admiring terms. Many, including self-appointed experts on the pseudo-politics of the walking dead, are inclined to dismiss it on the grounds of its amateur values, downplaying the matter for the favor of the more technically-competent – and challenging – endeavors. Perhaps they are the sorts raised in the shadow of the much more well-regarded “Dawn of the Dead,” which was the first of Romero’s zombie films to add the much-lauded sardonic cultural subtext to the ambitious flesh-ripping violence.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><span><a name='more'></a></span><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">If humor is, indeed, the quintessential tool to wield against a premise this bleak in a time when audiences value a sense of displacement from the nihilistic, then it is little wonder they have reservations about venturing far back into the nether-reaches of a black-and-white downer. None of the trademark wit or wry observations exist in this integral outing. A very real and terrible ordeal is occurring to the film’s characters, and their experiences are amplified tenfold by the depressing proclamations of a local television broadcast, ominously reminding us that mass killing are happening in nearly every major region of the country. The final sequence, a series of still shots that follow a shockingly fatalistic twist in the story, are likely to leave one feeling dejected or withdrawn instead of thrilled or amused. But it is precisely because the movie confronts the darkness so directly, without varnish or subterfuge, that “Night of the Living Dead” stands alone against its more cheerful cousins. In a world where the dead are literally tearing each other apart, this is a film that argues the only emotion worth regarding beneath the bloodcurdling fight for survival is exhaustion.</div><div><br /></div><div>The first half hour thoroughly forecasts that knowledge. A lone vehicle carrying two aged siblings (Judith O’Dea and Russell Streiner) pulls into an unremarkable cemetery with a spray of flowers in the backseat, their dialogue revealing their 200-mile trek into the late evening hours. They are there to pay respects to their deceased father, encouraged to do so by a mother who we gather is gifted at guilt trips, but not enough to compel herself to tag along. While standing at the gravesite, Johnny (Streiner) reminds his sister of mean little games they used to play during childhood, when he and neighborhood boys would convince her that the corpses beneath the headstones were going to attack them. “They are gonna get you, Barbra,” he playfully warns, his cheerful grin displacing him from the awareness that strange figures are lurking in the background of the frame. Gradually they move in. Closer, then closer, until they are no longer frivolous distractions but silent villains: the first of countless waves of zombies that will terrorize the camera frame of hundreds of future movies.</div><div><br /></div><div>Johnny is the horde’s first casualty, and poor hysterical Barbra is left to do little but flee aimlessly into the dimly-lit wilderness surrounding the cemetery. Her pursuers are slow but unrelenting, giving her just enough time to find suitable shelter at a lone house just beyond the burial ground (we surmise it must belong to the caretaker). Her face and body contort into frenetic expressions that would be right at home in a silent film, but it is the soundtrack that does all the literal emoting: piercing instrumental riffs that sound as if they could be mistaken as screams. Then, just as the attack of the dead just beyond the doors and the windows lets up enough to allow in some silence, Barbra makes the mistake of venturing upstairs. No matter how many times I have seen the film or how prepared I think I am, it never fails to startle me each time the camera first cuts to the rotting corpse on the landing.</div><div><br /></div><div>Others join Barbra in her forlorn isolation, starting with Ben (Duane Jones), who takes refuge in the house after his truck runs out of gas and he is accosted by the ghouls outside. Disciplined enough to shut out the possibility of them coming inside by barricading every entrance and window, something about his behavior suggests a shrewd vigilance for a moment like this – one, the movie quietly argues, that may be due to his experience as a minority at the dawn of the civil rights movement. After a momentary calm has settled over them, however, additional survivors make themselves known in the basement: a young couple (Keith Wayne and Judith Riley) who just want to stay safe without impeding the safety of others, and an older couple (Karl Hardman and Marilyn Eastman) who are far more guarded: downstairs, their young daughter Karen lies in slumber after experiencing a sudden and mysterious illness. The wife Helen fills the role as the prospective peace-keeper among the argumentative sorts as the threat from the outside begins to creep ever inward, but her husband Harry is combative and self-regarding, always quick to indicate how everyone’s suggestions but his own are the wrong way to go about survival. That also means he and Ben are destined to clash heatedly throughout the picture, and when there’s a brief attempt at a getaway that costs the two young lovers their lives, there is an eruption of emotions that perfectly embody all the racial tensions we unwittingly project into their volatile chemistry.</div><div><br /></div><div>Those exchanges became central to a filmmaker who saw his pictures as snapshots of their respective cultural structure, but what Romero probably did not intend, especially given his sense of casual credence, is that his casting of Duane Jones would essentially herald the arrival of a new wave of hard-boiled heroes, many of them people of color. Prior to “Night of the Living Dead,” black actors in American films were typically relegated to supporting roles, only having found a gradual tilt of importance since the recent emergence of Sidney Poitier, who even won an Oscar for an early breakout role. Duane Jones did not have the sort of illustrious career in movies as many of his contemporaries, but to look at Ben’s cynical sharpness and not see traces of Richard Roundtree’s John Shaft or Ron O’Neal’s Priest in “Super Fly” is to negate a key link in a chain of progressive characterization for minority leads, especially in crime thrillers and action pictures.</div><div><br /></div><div>All of that might have been merely theoretical had the film itself not undergone important re-releases in subsequent years. When it first arrived in drive-ins and local theater chains in the fall of 1968, in fact, critics and audiences alike were too appalled by the violence to pay the material much mind. Others still, particularly those from the phony moral patriarchy of 1960s middle America, protested to keep it out of wide distribution. When the cultural tide seemed to shift in the wake of the Manson murders of 1969, however, the stage seemed prime to look at Romero’s endeavor with freshly desensitized eyes. Soon the movie was undergoing midnight revivals in New York, Los Angeles and France, where it was swept up into the proverbial wind of cult legend. No one alive by the early 70s – including those who had declined to see it – could deny the presence of a strange little film about dead maniacs coming back to cannibalize the living, try as they might to displace it from their conscious awareness. Ironically, it would be Romero himself who would upstage that initial influence years later, when his own “Dawn of the Dead” was released to much wider acclaim, and today there is rarely a list of the most important horror films that does not name it as an essential genre standard.</div><div><br /></div><div>Yet it is the first, and certainly the most serious, that still holds sway over our hearts and minds. Perhaps it resonates so much more deeply precisely because it’s so deadpan: without humor or satire to upstage the concept, we are left to gaze upon the ordeals of the characters with some sense of despair. Perhaps the black-and-white gives the violence a more realistic edge, much in the same way “Psycho” benefits from the same trait: the shock of the action is elevated when the austerity of deep color does not interfere with it. Perhaps the rousing climax, a faceted overlap of dangerous ambushes and unexpected plot twists, is so perceptively modern in its execution – it seems to understand that the human experience inside danger is not always a straight line, but often a panicked flight of meandering last-minute decisions that depend entirely on luck. No director ever has the foresight to predict a shift in standard this drastic, but if Romero had stood on a soapbox back in ‘68 and called his movie the most influential of its kind, we would have accepted the statement all these years later as divine insight.</div><div><br /></div><div><div>Written by DAVID KEYES</div><div><br /></div><div><hr /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj-Oi7dhFiAKTQm_zAQHviBKgsaBtTjTHagLPmAiazuiv_Gf5WiufTT3m8LT5Y3TLdk7nLzWnaaB8QDhBPzJNkrveKCaZgcExyko9mAtNwd1W_3DEWM_5gr6O7Q0_vUqnni8qNRPm5DPgHa/s1600/Criterion-(Alternate).jpg" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="186" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj-Oi7dhFiAKTQm_zAQHviBKgsaBtTjTHagLPmAiazuiv_Gf5WiufTT3m8LT5Y3TLdk7nLzWnaaB8QDhBPzJNkrveKCaZgcExyko9mAtNwd1W_3DEWM_5gr6O7Q0_vUqnni8qNRPm5DPgHa/s200/Criterion-(Alternate).jpg" width="200" /></a></div><div><i>"Lessons in Criterion" is a series of essays devoted to exploring the films released within the Criterion Collection on Blu Ray and DVD. Noted for their notoriety or importance in their effect on the evolution of cinema, these films are not rated on the 4-star scale in order to preserve the intent of the work, which is to promote discussion and inspire thought on their relevance in the medium. More information on this and other titles can be found at <a href="http://criterion.com/">Criterion.com</a>.</i><br /><i><br /></i><i><b>"Night of the Living Dead"</b> is the twenty-second article in this series.</i></div></div></div>David Keyeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03067794906887523107noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2451838183910864405.post-51788612162791247852023-08-19T22:08:00.001-07:002023-08-19T22:08:15.634-07:00Talk to Me / *** (2023)<div style="text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjMHFAp2WvIOKK0vWDcttVSK-kwfr-oHJEXOz5JzNTmLcOIxS-ossX6hsIoQle3rrXPatZGzg25mh-eh0Zqf0lm7LxPO4GHQhjyE9ClrBboGbrdF_OMmL0H2Uu9Vj8pje_AsOfdkJzLCscmTL9UnafJNU4mp9hFer4d09SugmY9M8g7kpFrQip79CFwSSDQ/s1470/MV5BMWVjYjZjZTYtMDI1Zi00MGFmLTllYmYtOWQ3MDE1OTUzMjk1XkEyXkFqcGdeQXZ3ZXNsZXk@._V1_%20(1).jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="827" data-original-width="1470" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjMHFAp2WvIOKK0vWDcttVSK-kwfr-oHJEXOz5JzNTmLcOIxS-ossX6hsIoQle3rrXPatZGzg25mh-eh0Zqf0lm7LxPO4GHQhjyE9ClrBboGbrdF_OMmL0H2Uu9Vj8pje_AsOfdkJzLCscmTL9UnafJNU4mp9hFer4d09SugmY9M8g7kpFrQip79CFwSSDQ/w400-h225/MV5BMWVjYjZjZTYtMDI1Zi00MGFmLTllYmYtOWQ3MDE1OTUzMjk1XkEyXkFqcGdeQXZ3ZXNsZXk@._V1_%20(1).jpg" width="400" /></a></div>A plethora of fatal traumas attach themselves to dimwitted movie characters who dare to commune with the afterlife. Whether the opportunity comes from having paranormal ability, involving the talents of psychics or those ominous Ouija boards, the very act of drifting to the beyond and making contact with the dead has rarely proven lucrative, even for those who might do so for the means of plausible unfinished business. Yet such individuals hopelessly cling to the conceit that their experiences can be different than all which have preceded them, perhaps because the knowledge of existing ordeals and mistakes has compelled extra caution in the matter. Those are the sorts of people you rarely see in sequels to horror films – because unlike flesh-and-blood madmen who can be escaped or fought against, an evil force from the nether-world rarely gives up until they’ve claimed their target as a prize.<span><a name='more'></a></span><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">The ghostly line that connects likes of “The Haunting” to “Poltergeist” and “The Conjuring” is a long and meandering formula that has amused, shocked, horrified and thoroughly bored the long-term veterans of horror films, many of whom are rarely surprised at new attempts in a genre that has visited every dark corner on the supernatural map. But now we must contend with “Talk to Me,” a little surprise hit from Australia, about teenagers who engage in the pastime of connecting with the dead not as a means of curiosity but as an outlet for their hedonism. There is a scene early on that emphasizes the matter: a handful of friends each take turns holding the embalmed hand of a deceased fortune-teller, make contact with a spirit and allow it to enter their body – just long enough so that their cellphones can capture the footage for a viral trend on social media while the others in the room cheer it on. Unfortunately, their practice comes with two ominous warnings: 1) you can’t hold a connection with a spirit for longer than 90 seconds; and 2) if the spirit takes root, it will not let go until it can claim your life as its own. Before long their pleasure, driven by a strange high they achieve after exchanging energy with the souls of the afterlife, is stifled as one of them encounters something that latches onto the body of its living host, refusing to leave until it has consumed, battered and killed the one who dared to make the connection in the first place.</div><div><br /></div><div>Because we like the characters and have a sense of the experiences that created them, there are legitimate stakes involved in the material. The primary target of the story is Mia (Sophie Wilde), an aimless teenager whose mother passed away two years prior – in a situation that may or may not have been accidental suicide. Others regard her as a stick in the mud at their social gatherings and late-night parties, but when she volunteers to be the latest guinea pig to hold the embalmed hand, her experience elevates her to a star among ordinaries. Something about touching a soul from the dead is intoxicating, so much so that when another evening involving the hand occurs at the house of her best friend Jade (Alexandra Jensen), she is quick to undertake it again. And again. Then again. The audience senses the gravity of the pattern: all these repeating encounters with the dead are meant to move her closer into the labyrinth that will lead her to her deceased mother. But will she like the answer she offers? What happens when a connection is held too long with another during such a reunion, and a much more sinister presence latches on?</div><div><br /></div><div>“Talk to Me” doesn’t venture nearly as far off the beaten path as its premise might initially suggest, but for a ghost story in this era of sensation and relentless visual gimmick, it achieves a sort of gleeful allure by basically being well-written, concisely acted, photographed with skill and intellectually focused on the elusive prize of a plausible climax. Those are four traits rarely seen in unison in any number of recent genre outings, but somehow directors Danny and Michael Philippou have managed to compact them all into a 95-minute yarn that manages to accomplish much more than it is required to. There are moments I was amused, startled, baffled and even confused – and when was the last time you saw a horror film that could stir so many different feelings? In the annals of the recent past, where filmmakers are content to add to the fabric with one-note entertainments or derivative duplicates of much better pictures, here are two guys who have a new idea, pursue it through the labyrinthian abyss of uncertainty and emerge on the other side with something thoughtful.</div><div><br /></div><div>Is the movie scary? At times, particularly early on when the material is looking for its footing. Consider how the dead commune through their hosts, for example: during one possession, Mia’s eyes gloss over in black and she turns her attention to Riley (Joe Bird), Jade’s younger brother, where the spirit proceeds to inform him that he is being followed by something lurking in the background. This frames a shocking sequence later, when Riley becomes inhabited by a beast that not only wants to hold on, but intends to do as much damage as possible to the body on the outside. One might say this is the divisive moment when the film transitions from being silly fun to serious terror, but there is so much well-placed ambivalence in the early dialogue that we don’t initially suspect more will be amiss than usual. That means his possession hits us with a thud much in the same way it strikes the others off-guard. They are there to have fun with the dangerous and forbidden, not have it stick around and inspire chaos in the relationships and safety of the eyewitnesses.</div><div><br /></div><div>No person is more central to a rewarding conclusion than Mia. By the laws of all successful modern horror, her grief and trauma are the ideal weapons to yield against the dead, particularly as the spirits move in closer and the reliability of their warnings – villainous or otherwise – are placed in doubt by the contradictory behaviors of others. When her father finally reveals the contents of a private letter written by her deceased mother, for instance, is he telling the truth, or are the differing statements made by the apparition of the mom more factual? What about the warnings she provides regarding Riley? Is her suggestion a sound one, or influenced by a more devious detail? Not all stories of this nature gaze at the dead with blanket scorn, but all the obligatory suspicions rightfully arise when one of them seems to be speaking for the benefit of the living. And just when we think we know where it all might lead, the movie pulls yet another rug out from beneath us, leading to a climax that somehow manages to be both surprising and plausible without being overlong or meandering. A sequel, no doubt, will be a consequence of the open-ended final shot, but that is more or less a given with any successful genre picture of the 21st century. The Philippou brothers, however, have caught a glimpse of something that probably warrants added chapters. Think of how vast, how threatening the world beyond the veil is based on what the characters here endure. Their struggle goes to the advantage of every face under the theater screen that has come to seek a new thrill, and found a bit more than they expected.</div><div><br /></div><div>Written by DAVID KEYES</div><div><br /></div><div><div>Horror (Australia); 2023; Rated R; Running Time: 95 Minutes</div><div><br /></div><div>Cast:</div><div>Sophie Wilde: Mia</div><div>Alexandra Jensen: Jade</div><div>Joe Bird: Riley</div><div>Otis Dhanji: Daniel</div><div>Zoe Terakes: Hayley</div><div>Miranda Otto: Sue</div><div><br /></div><div>Produced by Kristina Ceyton, John Dummett, Noah Dummett, Sophie Green, Ari Harrison, Jeff Harrison, Phil Hunt, Samantha Jennings, Stephen Kelliher, Carly Maple, Daniel Negret, Miranda Otto, Danny Philippou, Michael Philippou, Dale Roberts, Compton Ross, Christopher Seeto and Alex White; Directed by Danny and Michael Philippou; Written by Danny Philippou and Bill Hinzman; based on a concept by Daley Pearson</div></div>David Keyeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03067794906887523107noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2451838183910864405.post-62077920948878467662023-08-14T20:48:00.001-07:002023-08-14T20:48:28.149-07:00Halloween / ***1/2 (1978)<div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEifs166ibsAB4cPGYSRCgYD_HXbFsr5wmL4GoEzLRv9B_Hdg8I99i3AIu9EOM2nof-OQVy-4k8-zUqifObIMWZc8ro6fgAKFCNO_D-TTGk59zBpFRahs_Tmte3h3hkwdi-A6jFM2SmRMj1BbKK0m-UPeUKTuWfZPEw88tUejvjJpQCZrl0bvNl9EJlCPLgK/s1438/18halloween1978-superJumbo-v2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="756" data-original-width="1438" height="210" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEifs166ibsAB4cPGYSRCgYD_HXbFsr5wmL4GoEzLRv9B_Hdg8I99i3AIu9EOM2nof-OQVy-4k8-zUqifObIMWZc8ro6fgAKFCNO_D-TTGk59zBpFRahs_Tmte3h3hkwdi-A6jFM2SmRMj1BbKK0m-UPeUKTuWfZPEw88tUejvjJpQCZrl0bvNl9EJlCPLgK/w400-h210/18halloween1978-superJumbo-v2.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>The key distinction between the original “Halloween” and “Psycho,” the movie it is most closely associated with, comes down to a need (or lack thereof) to understand the psychological motives of the villain. When it first caught audiences off guard in the fall of 1978, John Carpenter’s influential slasher was riding a new wave of reality-grounded horror films foreshadowed by the arrival of Norman Bates – ones that involved everyday people quietly evolving into the deviant madmen of old legends and bedtime stories. While it was always a given these individuals would become loathsome homicidal killers, now we were asking ourselves how we could not recognize the signs. Was there something in their genetic makeup that inspired the shift? A situation that destroyed their stability? Or gradual stressors no one else was seeing? Well before the era of criminal profiling made madmen of the flesh relatable, all we could do was study, ponder and then wait for the experts to assess the matter in pointed and revealing monologues. But the arrival of the Michael Meyers persona represented a startling shift away from the gray areas of movie villain psychology. When Dr. Loomis (Donald Sutherland), the man studying Meyers, is asked early on about what caused such a shy and quiet boy to murder his older sister in cold blood, his conclusion contradicts the very teachings of his profession. To him, there is nothing behind Michael’s eyes other than the dead and thoughtless conviction of a monster – a literal personification of evil, long detached from the human he once was.<span><a name='more'></a></span><br /></div><div><br /></div><div>His assertion is the overture in a horrific symphony that moves with all the cunning and strategy of a supernatural entity, to be metaphorically bookended in a final exchange where his lone survivor, Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis), ominously asks the mysterious Loomis if she has just confronted the boogeyman. Who can blame her? Like any practical teenager of the real world, our initial convictions hinge on a predisposed notion that there can be no such thing as literal monsters – only men who can sometime be programmed to undertake monstrous behaviors. After seeing and witnessing all that she experiences, the weight of the movie’s traumatic path forces us to reconsider the matter, much in the same way that Loomis and Laurie have done through the course of their encounters with the masked Michael. On its surface “Halloween” is a movie about a killer who haunts the shadows of young babysitters, but beneath the terror it is a challenge to the intellectual boundaries of the homicidal profile – including the belief that all violent maniacs must fit a certain box or operate with relatable compulsions.</div><div><br /></div><div>Not many voices spoke of such matters while the movie was at the height of its popularity, but in the years since its impact has eased and the skill replicated by an unending host of imitators and successors, Carpenter’s deeply-rooted thesis has emerged at the forefront of the discussion. If horror movies work only as well as the antagonist that drives their destructive engine, then here remains one of the most fascinating and frightening of our time – indeed, a being so menacing that he has inspired countless remakes, reboots and sequels in the 40-plus years his name was added to the cultural zeitgeist. Moreso than many of his contemporaries, Myers is not easily trapped by the traditions of mainstream outlaws who must reveal their hand or expose their agendas via long diatribes or complicated setups. There is one mode to his instinct: to stay quiet, focus on a single target and pounce when they wander into a dark space – hopefully while all alone. The mask, one of the most familiar signatures of the genre, is an adequate summation of his mystery and danger.</div><div><br /></div><div>The opening sequence sets the tone perfectly. During a seemingly insignificant Halloween night in the early 1960s, a point-of-view shot of a young boy shows him quietly meandering around the exteriors of a house in Haddonfield, Illinois. This is the place of his residence, although the absence of exposition doesn’t clarify so until after. He watches his sister through the window as she flirts with her teenage boyfriend, then wanders ominously into the kitchen after they have gone upstairs. A hand opens a drawer and extracts a large knife, held by a hand that continuously holds it in an offensive pose. The sister’s boyfriend leaves out the front door but does not notice the boy lingering beneath the stairs, and when he is out of sight, he ventures upwards, stopping long enough to put on a Halloween mask. The sister, not surprisingly, is still naked while seated in front of her mirror. She barely has time to react to little Michael’s presence before the knife comes down into her bare skin. One stab. Two stabs. They come again and again, until all that is left is a heap of blood and tissue lying lifelessly on the floor. Young Michael doesn’t merely begin his long career of terrible deeds with this single act but predicts the very movement that will inform nearly all the slashers of the coming decade: pleasures of the flesh must be punished with death, pain and sometimes prolonged suffering.</div><div><br /></div><div>Some of that occurs during the latter half of “Halloween,” but Carpenter is more concerned with dread than mere terror. The movie builds up cautiously to its violence, starting with the slow and calculated intrigue of the early scenes involving Laurie and her friends coming and going from school to home on foot, all while an unseen figure watches them from behind trees or bushes. At one point, a car speeds past them and her best friend Annie (Nancy Kyes) taunts the driver, who reacts by simply stalling at a distance. Later, when night has fallen and the girls are babysitting two children on the same street, their murderous stalker doesn’t immediately pounce on them, either. He continues to stay back, sometimes only appearing long enough between movements to remind us he is still there. The soundtrack establishes a pattern here: a harsh synth plays over the speakers just as the shadow moves into frame, then drops as he moves away from the action of the foreground.</div><div><br /></div><div>Meanwhile, Dr. Loomis pursues his escaped patient with the vigor of a desperate hunter closing in on rabid prey. Knowing where and how he will strike (perhaps it wasn’t a coincidence he escaped on Halloween), he haunts the outskirts of Haddonfield while looking for all the obligatory clues. Has he returned to the house he first murdered at? Has he visited the grave of his deceased sister? There is a moment early on where he comes across a maintenance worker’s abandoned truck but does not pick up on the camera’s discovery: a body in the nearby weeds that has been stripped of its uniform. Later, when the local undertaker stumbles upon the gravesite of the Meyers girl and discovers the headstone is missing, it establishes framework for a climax that promises to be more than just a loud chase sequence or violent ambush. Because the stakes seem so high, the cues so well-placed, the movie never fails to startle the cynic in us all when Laurie and Michael finally meet, during a moment when his white mask slowly emerges at the edge of the camera frame while she is hysterical with fright.</div><div><br /></div><div>Another unconventional detail: the film’s body count is surprisingly low. Moreover, none of Michael’s victims is murdered in graphic detail, either. Little blood is present on screen, with some deaths occurring by less gory means and most of the open wounds usually occurring in the distance or through impenetrable darkness. For later slashers this approach became only a line to cross; for Carpenter, it was the artistic slackline that placed him among the company of Hitchcock and Murnau, who understood that genuine horror had to be parceled in gradual increments instead of unleashed to the extreme. Much of that changed as the 70s closed, and even the “Halloween” franchise abandoned its own value system for the new frontier of gruesome shock value. The original, however, sacrifices nothing and achieves everything. It is a riveting testament to the timeless value of method and technique, favoring the chance to taunt the audience instead of deadening them to the onslaught of unending chaos. It’s little wonder that Laurie Strode was forever haunted by the events of that night. Behind that mask lurked a vision of nightmares, a symbol for all that was wrong and perverse about the human experience. Dr. Loomis had always been right. She did more than just survive a murder: she had engaged with the boogeyman.</div><div><br /></div><div>Written by DAVID KEYES</div><div><br /></div><div><div>Horror (US); 1978; Rated R; Running Time: 91 Minutes</div><div><br /></div><div>Cast:</div><div>Donald Pleasance: Dr. Loomis</div><div>Jamie Lee Curtis: Laurie Strode</div><div>Nancy Kyes: Annie</div><div>P.J. Soles: Lynda</div><div>Kyle Richards: Lindsey</div><div>Brian Andrews: Tommy</div><div>John Michael Graham: Bob</div><div><br /></div><div>Produced by Moutsapha Akkad, John Carpenter, Debra Hill, Kool Marder and Irwin Yablans; Directed by John Carpenter; Written by John Carpenter and Debra Hill</div></div>David Keyeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03067794906887523107noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2451838183910864405.post-11466471724788726552023-08-05T20:52:00.001-07:002023-08-05T22:15:24.339-07:00X / ***1/2 (2022)<div style="text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj9SwkMH6hdkCxIqTbDasTELUnebaSTjLBzEk5RaiIm91SQQZKdqLAlNSmJUrrmtSXy-vHT_NjRlNzJD8yIpJQP-kePEKgP8GLgRSTXMjxvm0diJR5YW35H0nNo2gQvflDIFBZizVovivLYjYNiTiFvQP1NAdJtBFgeRn9Yek0LYoYdeXGhwh7gHdSdz9fS/s2400/sxsw-film-review-x-ti-west.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1500" data-original-width="2400" height="250" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj9SwkMH6hdkCxIqTbDasTELUnebaSTjLBzEk5RaiIm91SQQZKdqLAlNSmJUrrmtSXy-vHT_NjRlNzJD8yIpJQP-kePEKgP8GLgRSTXMjxvm0diJR5YW35H0nNo2gQvflDIFBZizVovivLYjYNiTiFvQP1NAdJtBFgeRn9Yek0LYoYdeXGhwh7gHdSdz9fS/w400-h250/sxsw-film-review-x-ti-west.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>It comes to our notice early on in Ti West’s “X” that his probable casualties are far from being conventional pop-up targets. They occupy space in the movie with a sort of cheery displacement, fully cognizant of the danger that comes with their situation without letting their behaviors be entirely dictated by it. The scene: six young Texans with a penchant for southern euphemisms gather in a van, drive out into the country and rent the spare house on the property of an elderly couple – one of whom always seems to answer the door while holding a shotgun. Their objective: to turn this rickety old acquisition into the setting of an amateur porno, populated by aspiring adult film actors who have tagged along for their own slice of fame in the new frontier of home video. The ringleader, Wayne (Martin Henderson), foresees all the obligatory elements of fortune in this undertaking, but what he and the rest of his entourage are not able to successfully predict is that they’ve wandered into yet another backwoods nightmare of violent mayhem. The surprise, this time, is that they don’t go down without at least holding their own intellectually against the morose and cynical hunters they are destined to confront.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><span><a name='more'></a></span><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">The movie opens with an ominous inclination. In the silence of countryside morning, two local sheriffs wander into a bloody crime scene straight out of Texas Chainsaw territory – pieces of human bodies strewn across the front lawn, a shotgun on the wood floor, corpses propped up near the musty entrance of the old house, and an old television set in the corner of the front room playing the fiery sermon of a preacher. These are the overtures of countless horror films set in the grand old south, but our curiosity is piqued by a discovery they make off-screen just before the screen fades to black: something in the basement that we are not supposed to know about until much later, after the film has gone through and retraced its steps. Who are the people who lived there? Were they the ones who caused this grizzly scene, or did their horny visitors have some part to play in the final death display? The thing about the deep south in movie slashers is that it provides no shortage of unique maniacs, even after the likes of Leatherface and the mountain men in “Deliverance” have all but diminished the principal expectations.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">Pleasant surprises are one thing, but total and audacious deviations from formula are another. “X” breaks almost as many rules as it creates, adhering to standard just long enough to lull us into complacency before it twists, turns and then piles on one shocking scene after another, until what we are left with in the end is a sense of breathless delight. That may not be much of a shock to moviegoers already well-versed in the director’s filmography – his own “House of the Devil” and “The Innkeepers” already did wonders in flipping the scripts on haunted house and ghost stories, respectively – but even in this age of idea saturation there is only so far you can stretch common sense for the sake of a payoff. As I was watching this material unfold to familiar rhythms and sardonic self-awareness, I reached a point in my focus where not only did I not know what to expect, but was genuinely stunned to discover how some of its original ideas stayed within the plausible limits of human logic. When was the last time you saw a horror movie that performed such ambitious tricks while still keeping itself grounded in reality?<br /><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">It helps, of course, to have stars that look comfortable in the material. The six who make up the adventurous entourage of would-be pornographers consist of an arsenal of eclectic personalities – including Jackson (Kid Cudi), the male adult star whose war experience is almost as large as his appendage; RJ (Owen Campbell), the cameraman who loves avant-garde cinema so much that it informs all his camera angles and shots; Bobby-Lynne (Brittany Snow), a buxom blond who talks in cheery euphemisms while remaining absent-minded of nearby personality conflicts; and Lorraine (Jenna Ortega), the sound girl who is silent and judgmental through most of the shoot, until she decides she wants her own shot at adult film fame in the eleventh hour. Their activities and behaviors are driven as if conducted in a closed world of their making, away not just from civilization but also the cloud that hangs over them at the main house just across the hill. Only Maxine (Mia Goth), the star of their little production, seems to possess the cognizance to know something odd is occurring around them, and when she is invited into the musty corridors to engage with the old man’s fragile wife, she casts an ominous proclamation that is both sad and startling, especially for anyone of a certain age who might find it all familiar. If age is indeed the cruelest trick fate can play on us, imagine how it must feel to realize it can be weaponized against an ignorant youth.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">West builds all these details up via a framework of well-informed production values – sparse sound cues, long shots with few cuts, strategic camera placement and uncomfortably prolonged images that exist at the precipice of bottled tension. Not to be outdone by the key moment when Maxine and the elderly woman are involved in their uneasy encounter indoors, the best image in the entire film occurs just before they meet – all while she is skinny-dipping in the nearby lake while the old woman watches her from afar. We instinctively surmise her voyeurism is the first act of would-be antagonism, yet a spectacular overhead shot shows the young woman sharing the lake with an alligator, who moves in for its meal ever-so-slowly just before the girl reaches for the wooden pier. Is this unsettling near-miss a metaphor of what is to come, or a framing device to establish her as the lucky survivor in the eventual slaughter? West’s humor is that it could be either, and that the alligator may serve an added purpose when everything hits the fan.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">What follows a straightforward second act of pornographic antics in the guest house, insightful personal discoveries and musings on the nature of monogamy, is a series of climactic sequences that seem inspired by a vision far beyond those ordinarily entertained by directors of southern slashers. We have some level of understanding of the devious possibilities – especially given the subtle nods early on to “The Texas Chainsaw Massacre” and “The Hills Have Eyes,” this movie’s nearest cousins – but when the first big violent jolt arrives, it’s like having a wind knocked out of you. I was stunned and overjoyed by the way West’s screenplay takes all the familiar conventions, reduces them to red herrings and then sets the villains loose in an unpredictable laboratory of chaos and mayhem. Sometimes the results are funny, other times blatantly self-aware and modern. But there is a sophisticated edge to it all that hasn’t been this rich since Eli Roth’s “Cabin Fever,” also about ordinary horror tropes after a devious screenplay pulls the rug out from underneath audiences. Perhaps there’s a reason beyond mere entertainment why the idea of “X” has already inspired a prequel and a sequel, due to be released next year. Old dishes remain dependable if served with the right spice, and here is a movie that plays like the first course of a meal too delectable to turn away from. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">Written by DAVID KEYES</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><div>Horror (US); 2022; Rated R; Running Time: 105 Minutes</div><div><br /></div><div>Cast:</div><div>Mia Goth: Maxine</div><div>Jenna Ortega: Lorraine</div><div>Brittany Snow: Bobby-Lynne</div><div>Kid Cudi: Jackson</div><div>Martin Henderson: Wayne</div><div>Owen Campbell: RJ</div><div><br /></div><div>Produced by Jared Connon, Kid Cudi, Dennis Cummings, Jacob Jaffke, Harrison Kreiss, Ashley Levinson, Sam Levinson, Karina Manashil, Peter Phok, Kevin Turen and Ti West; Directed and written by Ti West</div></div>David Keyeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03067794906887523107noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2451838183910864405.post-38297382867648636222023-08-04T00:52:00.006-07:002023-08-04T00:52:00.158-07:00THE TALKATIVE KID, THE THOUGHTFUL ADULT – 25 Years as an Online Film Writer<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjTP6exeIl4DavMT6emPdLu7dlEwIPNbn_elOF4giG1Qfx3aylKqLMYnfy34klCQnLJltcMIw_soVTYL20v7FHaTvk2Cr1bDdOZF6eTaAkMY59yZ-Qt14GNCg7B_hKi9s705fS60JRuCBKh9s8kfxD955JZS8sDkCFxncu8aUra2dAzMwvyVFTXs_r7TpNa/s1328/anightmareinoz_a_picture_of_an_old_time_movie_projector_in_the__b6035de2-5306-4587-b3be-f99d4d1bf4e7.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="896" data-original-width="1328" height="270" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjTP6exeIl4DavMT6emPdLu7dlEwIPNbn_elOF4giG1Qfx3aylKqLMYnfy34klCQnLJltcMIw_soVTYL20v7FHaTvk2Cr1bDdOZF6eTaAkMY59yZ-Qt14GNCg7B_hKi9s705fS60JRuCBKh9s8kfxD955JZS8sDkCFxncu8aUra2dAzMwvyVFTXs_r7TpNa/w400-h270/anightmareinoz_a_picture_of_an_old_time_movie_projector_in_the__b6035de2-5306-4587-b3be-f99d4d1bf4e7.png" width="400" /></a></div>25 years ago today, a young inexperienced journalist with a passion for gabbing about film took to the Internet on a journey to add his voice to the growing throng of web-based personalities, and yet another new amateur movie blogger was born. Eventually branding himself a “Cinemaphile” – that is, someone who prefers the experience of watching films in theaters instead of at home – he became tirelessly motivated by the panache of more experienced critics while he was formulating his own distinct voice, one that sought to add a little flair and wit to the mix while mirroring the values of an eccentric juvenile. Sometimes that aroused anger in readers, other times surprise and dismay. But it was all part of being in a fun and exciting new frontier, back when cyberspace was mostly in the grasp of computer nerds and the clap-backs came from genuine, hardcore film buffs. They didn’t just argue or dismiss a review, either. Some of them added enlightening contexts that were previously lacking, or at least had the patience to educate their target instead of just cutting him or her down to size. Those exchanges reflected the unspoken importance of criticism in a time when the validity of it was coming into doubt, just as the online world was allowing an entire generation of spectators to plug in and add their voice to a crowd of millions.<span><a name='more'></a></span><br /><br />It was a time of discovery, an age of innocence and the precipice of a shifting tone in the cultural zeitgeist. We were eager, passionate, optimistic about the future without realizing the darkness that lay ahead. In that narrow space between adolescence and adulthood when we felt our minds moved by the prospect of knowledge, no challenge was too great to conquer. The written word became a weapon we could wield against the offenses of marginal minds, or a shield to conceal our own insecurities. On rarer occasions, the words sought to gratify the achievements of filmmakers who would probably never read them. But that was never the point. A movie blog is a personal diary of your feelings of the moment, a document about what you experience and how your life is shaped by all the images you absorb and contemplate. If you feel strongly about something, as I did with, say, the “Lord of the Rings” trilogy, you hope to look back at it and gleam the experience from the words preserved in the essay. That can be more theoretical than literal when you are a young novice, but sometimes you can only learn in the moment, dust off your errors, and try again.<br /><br />I’ve followed that technique for the entirety of my life online, and I’d argue that it has made me a fairly competent voice in any serious discussion about the cinema. Practice, alas, trickles to a slow crawl in these times while the focus of the industry has shifted beyond my understanding. I don’t talk or write about the movies nearly as much as I used to – partially due to a prominent lack of desire. The movies, for better or worse, have become a practice of mass appeal, catering to the needs of audiences who see the world from a more literal lens than an ironic or nuanced one. In the days of my earliest outings as a film critic, serious pictures were made with a mind to highlight the dichotomy of the human existence. They recognized life as a balancing act between joy and sorrow, hero and villain, tragedy and triumph, justice and prejudice. Today’s mainstream offerings, unfortunately, have by and large replaced nuance with simplified precision, existing so that every detail and attribute is explained instead of allowing moviegoers to think and decide for themselves. There are exceptions, of course – notably with filmmakers who are veterans of the craft – but the prison of big studios have usually relegated their work to the margins. In those days the margins belonged to indie art-house theaters. These days most of them skip theaters altogether and go straight to streaming services, where they are usually buried beneath the muck of countless new bad movies that flood the digital cloud.<br /><br />Is that my old age showing? Absolutely. But I have no major hang-ups about the trajectory, either. Just as film has changed, so too has the voice of the critic. It requires more youthful, present energy than I am able to give. Younger filmgoers are the primary target for what Disney or Marvel have to offer. Their stories mean more to a generation that has more practice at implementing their values. The mainstream is very much about acceptance, diversity and inclusion. They are the most important measures in the eyes of the young – perhaps far more important than art, technique, style or tone. There is where the divide has been made, and while I fully support their journey, my heart moves towards another: writing and releasing my own fiction based on the great lessons I learned from capable screenwriters.<br /><br />Yet my film blog is still being visited and absorbed – perhaps now more than it had been when it was at the peak of its activity. Before my output began to dwindle in 2019, I averaged between 1 to 5000 hits a day. A year later, that number swelled to 30 thousand, most of it involving essays about independent films or documentaries. As of this writing and only six reviews into the calendar year, the Cinemaphile Blog is still being visited at a higher rate than it was when I averaged over 100 new articles over twelve months. That is both a bittersweet and an enlightening pill to swallow: it means my contributions to the fold remain somewhat of a necessity, even if the point of them doesn’t always correlate well to the reaction they cause. Consider, for example, the article I wrote two years ago about an indie found footage horror film called “The Miranda Murders,” which attempts – unsuccessfully, in my opinion – to reconstruct the video footage shot by Leonard Lake and Charles Ng, who imprisoned and murdered dozens of victims in California throughout the mid-80s. Many readers didn’t respond so favorably to my takedown of the material, although its own director, Matthew Rosvally, left me a cogent rebuttal in the comments section a few months after it was published. That gesture meant a great deal to a lowly online writer who could never be certain if there was room at the discussion table for his views. Rosvally’s film is still not one I can favor, but there’s no question that he sought to make a good film – and will no doubt make one in the future that I have a much more favorable reaction to.<br /><br />If his words eased the tension brought on by less cordial (and even vicious) replies, it at least came after I developed some thicker skin. I have become used to the mob of angry outcriers, and there is no shortage of memories that come to mind whenever I’m asked about heated discussions with readers regarding my opinions on a film. I’ve been called every name in the book, ranging from intellectual insults to homophobic slurs and every expletive in between. Some have demanded my resignation after I’ve trashed something they love so dearly. Others still wished for pain and suffering. Not all my rebuttals have been civil, but I’m more forgiving of my younger self that way; when you are a teenager convinced that you belong where you’ve placed yourself, it’s easy to be swallowed up in the vitriol instead of distancing yourself from it.<br /><br />These days, just a couple years into my 40s, I’ve let go of a lot of the hangups and raw emotions that have unfairly attached themselves to the work as it was written. All that is left are the reviews. Some are better than others, but all of them stand by you. They are records of moments in time, ones that you have willingly shared with the world in hopes that they might entertain, inspire or even enlighten. Some days, I’m compelled to write more. When that occasion comes, I hope to still find you all here, ready to listen, to react and even challenge when the need calls for it. That’s all part of what makes this venture so dynamic. And if I am able to learn from my readers as much as I have offered up here in my little corner of the internet, that makes the entire process all the more enriching.<br /><br />I’ll see you at the movies. Perhaps even sooner than you think.<p></p><div>Written by DAVID KEYES</div>David Keyeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03067794906887523107noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2451838183910864405.post-91706308037289051972023-07-29T20:41:00.003-07:002023-07-29T20:41:46.761-07:00When a Stranger Calls / *** (1979)<div style="text-align: justify;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhZ34x6h4y9Fu6vsav8kmBMnJErXmzfj_V3mx9R_lXh4r-4JU-1XIv3FMHK4__CSJcGygJDKhRTf54m76dCNDsznbOGvYhtxFYt3KLIfwPbonqYlsbXwYHv7wzGwHAYSh93hTG1fHyyoeGt9uYl6kZQ56ek0-mFgx8Lz13hfgmrXJ7dVRut_0WnffNHoiG4/s1380/When-a-Stranger-Calls-1979-4.jpg" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="751" data-original-width="1380" height="217" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhZ34x6h4y9Fu6vsav8kmBMnJErXmzfj_V3mx9R_lXh4r-4JU-1XIv3FMHK4__CSJcGygJDKhRTf54m76dCNDsznbOGvYhtxFYt3KLIfwPbonqYlsbXwYHv7wzGwHAYSh93hTG1fHyyoeGt9uYl6kZQ56ek0-mFgx8Lz13hfgmrXJ7dVRut_0WnffNHoiG4/w400-h217/When-a-Stranger-Calls-1979-4.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>“When a Stranger Calls” endures primarily for two sequences that bookend a fairly routine middle act. The first, in which a young high school babysitter (Carol Kane) is left alone in a neighbor’s house while a menacing voice hurls ominous warnings over a phone (“I want to feel your blood on me”), is the total summation of a director evoking all the qualities of a thrilling short subject, while the latter manages to play into the same tension as her long ordeal – and the trajectory of the villain – come full circle. But compelled by the success of “Halloween” and the urgings of studio heads who wanted their own slice of the new bloody pie that was teenage slashers, Fred Walton’s material became a full-length feature marred by conflicting values: meandering pacing, unconvincing heroes, implausible setups and a plethora of fairly uninteresting extra characters randomly stuffed in an underwritten screenplay. Yet to watch the film in its entirety is to find an intriguing case study in the differing values of the long and short forms of this medium. Was Walton just too exhausted by wallop of the first and last sequences to really commit himself to something great for a full-length endeavor? The movie is hardly worthless or even insulting – there are, in fact, some passable stuff among all the middle muck – but so brilliant are the opening and closing passages that they deserved more than just an average link in the chain.<span><a name='more'></a></span><br /><br />Let’s consider, at least, the spark that drove his initial creativity. Based around an old urban legend about a babysitter who gets harassing calls from a menace that may in fact be located just upstairs, the premise previously served to fuel the rousing climax to “Black Christmas,” that 1973 film often credited with preceding “Halloween” in the emerging new age of modern crime-based horror. Like that movie, a great weight of dread passes through the eyes of the stalked and directly into the hearts of the committed viewer, who suspects what is obvious but clings to the hope, however misplaced, that the terrified victim might persevere against her brutal attacker. A great number of teenagers up against Michael Myers were never able to match wits with their killer, and for much of the first 20 minutes of “When a Stranger Calls,” we aren’t entirely convinced that Jill (Carol Kane) is going to fair any better either. She is terrified, haunted, uncertain. Her eyes show it all even as her voice attempts to remain firm, her posture guarded. “Have you checked the children?” the voice asks. They are asleep upstairs, but she is too afraid to go up and discover exactly what he means – both wise and strategic, at least for the purpose of the sequence’s decisive reveal. She places a call to the police and begs them to trace its origin, but then is horrified to hear after one final macabre taunt that the voice belongs to someone inside the house – and when she ventures towards the front door to leave, his shadow emerges in the hallway as if poised to pounce.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Who is this ominous stranger? The short subject never discloses his identity. In the longer and more procedural version, we discover he is Curt Duncan (Tony Beckley), a loner who murdered the two children upstairs, sought to do the same to their babysitter but was then apprehended and sent off to live the remainder of his years in a psychiatric ward, where doctors and nurses document his mental spiral on audio tapes to play over ensuing dialogue exchanges. Seven years later he escapes captivity and wanders off into the streets of New York, propelling the FBI agent that first caught him (Charles Durning) to follow the trail before it becomes cold. It turns out he doesn’t have to wait very long for leads; shortly after the escape, Curt begins trolling slum bars and leering over lonely women with chips on their shoulders – the most notable being Tracy (Colleen Dewhurst), who so protests his meek come-ons that it ends with him bruised and bloodied by a would-be protector on the other side of the nearby pool table.<br /><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Later that night, almost upon cue, Tracy returns home and find him waiting for her there – “to apologize,” he says, although it is she who expresses the most regret after catching a glimpse of all his bruises. “I didn’t mean for you to get beat up,” she replies, just before she excuses herself to answer the phone. Common sense runs out before the scene is even over: after going into her apartment, she leaves the door wide open and unattended, just so that he can wander in and instill a sense of dread in her newly-optimistic approach. Quick: how many people do you know who live in the big city who leave their doors unlocked when a creepy person is just on the other side of it?<br /><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">No matter. The next day, John Clifford (Durning) discovers the escaped madman has set his sights on Tracy and makes an appearance at her place of residence long enough to acquire her help, although the movie never really clarifies how he discovered this information. There are additional side encounters to fill time, including some with a group of homeless men and women who may keep company with Curt while he lays low, and a local police lieutenant named Charlie Garber (Ron O’Neal), who quickly surmises that John is there for more than just a mere apprehension of the accused (“take your time and do it right”). Just as the murderer’s temptation grows, so does the obsessive nature of his hunter, and when they eventually come to encounter one another in the first of two climaxes, they seem almost at peace with the prospect, as if both actors have resigned themselves to playing the behaviors without benefit of their own intellectual displacement.<br /><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Perhaps, in better and more tempered material, both Charles Durning and Tony Beckley would have brought some shrewd sophistication to their performances instead of just going through perfunctory motions. Beckley, who was terminally ill at the time of production, is at least plausible in the other scenes – especially those with Dewhurst, who balances his brand of nuanced creepiness with her own recipe of fearful resentment and cautious awareness. But none of that can be said of Durning, who is normally a more agreeable and likable screen presence than what this material suggests. That’s because he is simply the wrong brand of personality for a hard-boiled police detective, and that gives his time on screen an air of amateurish defiance. There is a scene between him and the police lieutenant where he is supposed to verbally confess all his loathing and resentment that comes with the Duncan case, but we are never convinced there’s anything to the matter other than just words. It’s all just empty gestures, only serving to foreshadow a chase sequence that seems more forced than tense. The movie, furthermore, is alarmingly light on violence despite its R rating. When you’re dealing with a premise this grim, what’s the purpose of holding back a critical gut-punch if the rest of the story is barely swinging to begin with?<br /><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">If there is a silver lining to the slog of the second act, it’s that Curt is forced back to his original hunting grounds to pursue Jill again, who is now married with two children of her own. Seemingly recovered from her earlier ordeal and out to dinner with her newly-promoted husband, all the old fears return when she answers a call at the front desk of the restaurant, and his ominous words come back to haunt her. “Not again!” she screams. This is all a precursor to a series of jump scares and surprise ambushes that keep with the tone and spirit of the early scenes, and a final showdown that allows Curt to connect with the very real evil lurking inside his character, if only for a very brief moment. His apprehension up to that point, I’m sure, was a shooting schedule that probably rushed him and his co-stars through writing that never went through dramatic consideration. It needed two or three rewrites before it was ready to be shot. All the same, Beckley connects with the devious gusto that we expected and hoped for well before his time comes to an end. They key is getting through much of the nonsense that precedes it. Better movies would be made about this idea, including the “Scream” pictures, also about homicidal maniacs taunting their victims on the phone before killing them. But for the brief passages in which “When a Stranger Calls” has a grip on our attention, we are rewarded with the sort of heart-pounding atmosphere and engrossing tension that would have made even Hitchcock proud.<br /><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Written by DAVID KEYES<br /><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;"><br /></span></span></b></div><b style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Horror/Thriller (US); 1979; Rated R; Running Time: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt; text-align: justify;">97 Minutes<br /></span><span style="font-size: 10pt; text-align: justify;"> <br /></span><b style="text-align: justify;"><u><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Cast:<br /></span></u></b><b style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Carol Kane: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt; text-align: justify;">Jill Johnson<br /></span><b style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Charles Durning: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt; text-align: justify;">John Clifford<br /></span><b style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Tony Beckley: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt; text-align: justify;">Curt Duncan<br /></span><b style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Colleen Dewhurst: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt; text-align: justify;">Tracy<br /></span><div style="text-align: justify;"><b><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Ron O’Neal: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Lt. Charlie Garber</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;"><br /></span></span></b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Produced by </span></span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Doug Chapin, Steve Feke,
Larry Kostroff, Barry Krost and Melvin Simon</span><span style="font-size: 10pt;">; <b>Directed
by </b><span style="mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Fred Walton;<b> Written by </b>Steve
Feke and Fred Walton</span></span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><br /></span></b></div>David Keyeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03067794906887523107noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2451838183910864405.post-12903018115139743342023-07-21T16:22:00.001-07:002023-07-21T16:23:03.541-07:00Death Proof / *** (2007)<div style="text-align: left;"><i><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhSaQMmACIyypoQk3NWPeTcPYtoh2XP6gyM5pexBd77kfGIjZkaO5B3Xopg8JyuKS8ECjsY6uyw_TsF83odkUoqSZhEMKYqk02eJWboIJ3fdCbF0ca8OQ964ILVblEz42NwTdnu1U2vKTcF3wQUTRgyGaK0oETLJdpggcx3CBIqL2cIkNNqOCxoUO94YX6E/s980/deathproof.png" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="652" data-original-width="980" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhSaQMmACIyypoQk3NWPeTcPYtoh2XP6gyM5pexBd77kfGIjZkaO5B3Xopg8JyuKS8ECjsY6uyw_TsF83odkUoqSZhEMKYqk02eJWboIJ3fdCbF0ca8OQ964ILVblEz42NwTdnu1U2vKTcF3wQUTRgyGaK0oETLJdpggcx3CBIqL2cIkNNqOCxoUO94YX6E/w400-h266/deathproof.png" width="400" /></a></div>“There are few things as fetching as a bruised ego on a beautiful angel.”</i><br /><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">There’s little more that can be said of the Tarantino method that hasn’t already been analyzed by countless critics and film historians, but if one were to attempt and condense all his sensibilities into a single opus, “Death Proof” contains just about every trait worth mentioning. Made on a whim along with Robert Rodriguez’ “Planet Terror” as part of their 2007 Grindhouse throwback, the movie is a shameless clash of underground 1970s sensibilities, married by a plot that plays like a spaghetti western and dialogue that has all the sophisticated awareness of blaxploitation. Sometimes, particularly in the slower moments, we sense a twinkle of glee emulating from the material, as if its director has found content that exists just for his sake as opposed to one that he must mold and refine. If the likes of “Kill Bill” or “Django Unchained” are imprinted with his signature, his lone horror film is more like an old tattoo: as much a part of him as he is a part of the culture of underground B-movie shlock that first gave him his creative wings so long ago.<br /><span><a name='more'></a></span><br />Watching the movie for the first time long after it made its debut, I was struck by how wrapped up in the details I got, knowing full well that it all beats to a familiar rhythm and rarely strays from his witty and macabre formula. That can be a boring realization in less capable or interesting hands. In Tarantino’s, it gives him the space to embellish and exploit our expectations to a point of bemused awe. An early scene emphasizes the matter: three friends are engaging in a discussion at a bar that involves Julia (Sydney Tamiia Poitier), a radio personality, informing her pal Arlene “Butterfly” (Vanessa Ferlito) about a personal reveal she made on her morning radio show. The reveal is a tip-off for the inevitable come-ons that Butterfly might experience in the evening, when men might recite a detail from the broadcast in hopes of her giving them a pre-promised lap-dance. In most movies this would be a move to inspire outrage or even hostility. Butterfly’s annoyance is too casual to let it disrupt her good time, and later that evening, when a mysterious man recites the words in hopes of getting said dance, it is Julia who is quick to jump in and attempt to nullify the matter. Little do either of them know, the mysterious stuntman with a long scar on his face and an Icy Hot endorsement jacket is actually a vicious madman, who later that night will crash his vehicle into theirs and herald the dawn of an endless marathon of bloodshed and violence for the remainder of the film’s running time.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Why is that early scene so important to what follows? Because it creates a puzzle, however superfluous, that raises the stakes of the characters we follow. They are no longer mindless sexpots lined up to be picked off, instead becoming thinking, breathing beings with interests and intellect – enough, thankfully, that when Stuntman Mike (Kurt Russell) first engages with them, they are cognizant enough to recognize that his black car had been following them earlier in the day. That in turn creates a devious tension with the lap dance sequence, which accomplishes the rare quality of being both seductive and ominous without directly revealing the possibilities of the inevitable outcome. By definition those details make Tarantino probably far too well-equipped to do true justice to the transgressive nature of grindhouse pictures, but this is the garden where most of his seeds were harvested, and it is only fair for him to claim the overgrowth as his own.<br /><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">“Death Proof” is a strange, funny, observant, intricate and ambitious little horror film in which the horror is not about how many limbs are severed or how mutilated someone will become at the end of a high-speed massacre, but about how an unpredictable villain can stalk, taunt, manipulate and ultimately amuse himself so casually with the ambivalent nature of his victims well before he plans to kill them on the open road. In much more grandiose or serious material, he’d be the kind of antagonist Anthony Hopkins or Robert Mitchum would gaze at in amazement. Yet because Tarantino’s screenplay refuses to just let the prospective victims be shallow or dumb, that means we can’t exactly be sure how events will play out: will they all go down with the same hysterical hopelessness of the victims in any number of Dead Teenager films, or will they fight their way through the madness enough to raise the stakes of the outcome? It’s anyone’s guess how a movie like this might resolve itself, and to say that now, so long after we’ve seen all the tricks of the trade, is to marvel at how endlessly unpredictable its director remains.<br /><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Other staples he finds time to invest in: dialogue about pop culture references, emphasis on fictional brand names, a jukebox that plays obscure 70s songs, long passages of observation with no dialogue, and camera shots that linger a little longer than they are expected to – mostly to give the audience the time to realize there is a critical detail in the backdrop they might otherwise be missing. Also not surprising, either, is how the movie shifts its story at the halfway point to a different locale – while the first act occurs in Austin, surrounding the three aforementioned friends on a night of drinking, the second takes place in Lebanon Tennessee a few months later, where another three emerge in the crosshairs of the murderous Stunt Man. Notice, also, how the early half of the picture appears to be shot in film stock that is scratched and burned as it passes through the projector, occasionally punctuated by abrupt edits, shaky still shots or cuts that inadvertently overlap, causing the dialogue to be heard twice in the same moment. Later, when the story moves to its second locale, a brief strip of black-and-white film stock bridges the events of the first arc to the second, which is polished and crisped like a movie made in the 2000s ought to be. What can be said of the era, though? Despite many of the characters clearly styled in 70s costumes and hairstyles, some of them carry cellphones, while others discuss burning CDs for loved ones. In this world, much like all others under Quentin’s umbrella, all eras have converged. And perhaps the shift in film stock is more a nod to the old grindhouse method, when directors used whatever film stock was supplied to them in the moment and often made pictures that utilized multiple.<br /><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">If there is something profound that can be said of the technical shift and how it correlates to the story, perhaps its an indication that a woman’s sense of survival may depend more on the place and time for which they exist. Assume, for example, that the earlier characters are in fact operating in the headspace of a 70s movie. They are smart but uncultivated feminists, not yet aware of all the dangers men pose to them. They are not supposed to endure beyond the final fade-out. Now contrast that what occurs to the prospective victims of the latter half. These women are much more savvy and less reactionary, unwilling to give up even as the odds are stacked against them. The climactic chase on the road seems destined to end one way, but somehow we know well before that they will turn the tables – because they embody the spirit of the shifting cultural tide. The title, perhaps, is both a riddle and a statement. Is it really about the car the stunt man drives? Or is it about women who will defy it when the chips are down?</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="text-align: left;">Written by DAVID KEYES</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><b><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Horror/Comedy
(US); 2007; Rated R; Running Time: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">127 Minutes</span><br /><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span><br /><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><u><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Cast:</span></u></b><br /><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Kurt Russell: Stuntman Mike</span></b><br /><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Zoe Bell: Zoe Bell</span></b><br /><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Rosario Dawson: Abernathy</span></b><br /><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Tracie Thorns: Kim</span></b><br /><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Vanessa Ferlito: Arlene</span></b><br /><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Sydney Tamiia Poitier: Jungle Julia</span></b><br /><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Rose McGowan: Pam</span></b><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><br /></span></b><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Produced by </span></span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Elizabeth Avellan, Shannon
McIntosh, Robert Rodriguez, Pilar Savone, Bill Scott, James W. Skotchdopole,
Erica Steinberg, Quentin Tarantino, Bob Weinstein and Harvey Weinstein</span><span style="font-size: 10pt;">; <b>Directed and written by </b><span style="mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Quentin Tarantino</span></span></div></div>David Keyeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03067794906887523107noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2451838183910864405.post-76556362074861687132023-07-15T19:33:00.001-07:002023-07-15T19:33:25.545-07:00The Outwaters / * (2022)<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh5Gqq2EFcbqKV-7fYLfTjR3p-oY10gz9AJ22Hz7cUl5Cj4eyOMQ0RbzxCd8luULZ3c24_DpXsBXhZ-VgHf5vj3fX-_XhGiw7Flg3kP6jebb0TiVFq4NHdZYp6GJrUBjeR-dmsKqLDQamUQMdnf-KH8sW9UzzWCI6pAfOVmoeQ4S6F95tktBUyKlHzEmiUt/s1000/The-Outwaters%20copy.png" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="564" data-original-width="1000" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh5Gqq2EFcbqKV-7fYLfTjR3p-oY10gz9AJ22Hz7cUl5Cj4eyOMQ0RbzxCd8luULZ3c24_DpXsBXhZ-VgHf5vj3fX-_XhGiw7Flg3kP6jebb0TiVFq4NHdZYp6GJrUBjeR-dmsKqLDQamUQMdnf-KH8sW9UzzWCI6pAfOVmoeQ4S6F95tktBUyKlHzEmiUt/w400-h225/The-Outwaters%20copy.png" width="400" /></a></div>Somewhere in the vacant expanse that is the Mojave desert, four friends with unfledged verbal skills will partake in a sad, confusing ambush in the dark that culminates with lots of screaming and blood splatters, all to be barely spied by a camera lens that is always shooting at unflattering angles while a small flashlight ray attempts to zero in on thoroughly uninteresting findings. That is the central engine behind “The Outwaters,” yet another found footage yarn that comes to us with an even loftier promise: all that is about to happen will defy the very basic notions of this subgenre’s primary formula. Defy it does, but to what end? To confuse and sadden the audience? To get them thinking beyond ordinary horror movie trappings? I would have only welcomed that change. Alas, director Robbie Banfitch, obviously new to the fold of this form of storytelling, finds nothing in the dark other than our collective anger at having been left adrift in a confusing and listless story that ends with few certainties and even fewer solutions. There is nothing to think about on screen, no image to anchor curiosity or theme to create a sense of investment. All that might have been eased by the existence of characters who knew how to discuss their plight, but the movie only gives us simpletons who don’t seem to remember basic emotional cues, much less create a running dialogue about what may be lurking in the shadows of the desert.<span><a name='more'></a></span><br /><p></p><p>Why are they there in the first place? The first hour slowly unpacks the premise as if it lacks general interest in the details. We first meet Rob (Robbie Banfitch), an aspiring filmmaker, and his brother Scott (Scott Schamell), whose early footage basically consists of them smiling aimlessly at little discoveries while engaging in sparse small-talk. Eventually their boredom is interrupted by the arrival of Ange (Angela Basolis), a bohemian artist who specializes in pseudo-psychedelic folk music and is nearing the release of her first album. That leads to an arrangement in which Rob and Scott will accompany her into the desert to shoot her first music video, alone and isolated (conveniently) from those who might be useful in assisting in obligatory rescue. Also along for the ride is a hairdresser named Michelle (Michelle May), who is likely only there just so the story has enough screaming victims to exploit in the final act.</p><p>While there, the party stare cutely and aloof at each other, bask in the sun, go swimming, contemplate their place in nature and only communicate verbally long enough so that each other knows the other is nearby. They are all smiles, of course, but that is only based on the slimmest of evidence; Rob’s camera – the lone source of footage – is rarely focused on anything in particular, often beginning and ending takes in mid sentence or pointed downward on bare feet standing atop the arid desert sands. Given the hyper-docile approach of the material, one might surmise Banfitch is attempting to mimic the casual in-the-moment realism of Linklater or Malick, but their films at least had the benefit of dialogue that seemed written. “The Outwaters” consists of everyone speaking in fragments of stray thoughts. They don’t seem to be present in any moment or situation, so that when weird and inexplicable things begin to happen to them out there in the dark, they don’t have the cognizance to react plausibly. Theirs is an existence that a more alert or observant picture would recognize as a drug-induced haze.</p><p>At the halfway point of this 110-minute slog, things begin to descend into total chaos. Not just in the regard of the obligatory horror formula, mind you, but also in respect to what the camera captures. Darkness comes. Noises transfix the four observers. A strange, almost supernatural phenomenon occurs in relation to a mound of dirt near their campsite, which emits strange vibrations of energy that Rob’s audio equipment is quick to pick up on. An abandoned ax is found ominously sitting at the top of a hill. Insects gather on the surface of the sand in alarming numbers. They are swarmed by bees, fire ants, and locusts. When night falls on the penultimate night of their proposed fate, all details are lost as a single beam of flashlight attempts to piece together the reality of the nightmare, and fails miserably. We hear all the perfunctory indications of a horrible situation – including screaming, running around and breathless denials that echo in the camera microphone, but what are they up against? Is there a monster out there? An alien entity? Something they are manufacturing in their minds? Characters with more pronounced social skills might have offered enough in the way of clues to guide our suspicions. These four are so detached from the mere notion of their terror that their alarm seems sourced out of some inner hysteria they refuse to enlighten us on.</p><p>The one possible indication, at least from what I can gauge from the shoddy daylight footage, is that the foursome are being attacked by giant red worms that emit high-pitched screams as they slither nearby. That is only theoretical, however, given that they are never actually seen in attack mode, and only show up long enough to slither between exposed legs and then out of the camera frame again. Think about the impulses of a competent cameraman who might be in fear of his life while clutching a handheld video device. Wouldn’t he want to focus on the source of his terror? To pursue it for as long as he draws breath? Or at least get a good shot for posterity instead of artistically focusing on quirky angles to shoot the desert floor with? Common psychology dictates that the presence of recording equipment in the middle of danger makes it a lifeline to its possessor, as if holding onto it is a measure of protection against something that might attack or be fatal. The victims in “The Blair Witch Project” and nearly all found footage films that came after understood this assignment. Did Robbie Banfitch pay attention to any of this in his studies, or was he too enamored by the audacity of the unconventional to allow common sense to take root?</p><p>The movie is without thrills, pacing, skill or basic engagement, existing on screen for nearly two hours while simultaneously refusing to give the viewers anything to think about or be scared of. That is a sad conclusion to make for any film, but especially frustrating is having to say it about a movie that at least seems to be made from the conceit of something novel: no matter how you might feel about the end result, at least no one can accuse its director of just sticking to the tired formula. In some circles that was more than enough reason to endorse the material, too. Just take a glimpse of a handful of the reviews on the Tomatometer if you are curious: while some argue the slow and deliberate pacing only adds to the intrigue, others have heralded the material as something bold and decisive. One critic, in fact, even writes that the film is in the bold tradition of H.P. Lovecraft, who too was enamored by giant slimy beasts dwelling in the sand. If he had been alive today, one wonders if he might have resisted the urge to file a lawsuit on the writer for defamation of character.</p><div>Written by DAVID KEYES</div><div><b style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><br />Horror
(US); 2022; Not Rated; Running Time: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt; text-align: justify;">110 Minutes</span></div><div>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span><b><u><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Cast:<br /></span></u></b><b><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Robbie Banfitch: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Robbie Zagorac<br /></span><b><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Angela Basolis:</span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt;"> Ange Bocuzzi<br /></span><b><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Scott Schamell: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Scott Zagorac<br /></span><b><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Michelle May: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Michelle August<br /></span><b><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Leslie Ann Banfitch: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Leslie Zagorac</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Produced by </span></span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Robert Abramoff, Robbie
Banfitch and Beau J. Genot</span><span style="font-size: 10pt;">; <b>Directed
and written by </b><span style="mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Robbie Banfitch</span></span></p></div>David Keyeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03067794906887523107noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2451838183910864405.post-44293507190208700002023-02-12T15:46:00.003-08:002023-07-15T19:36:25.295-07:00Into the Storm / ** (2014)<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjOE346SytvNipw7FNvnsnkK0KaWZLu6AGf-IKc5bxL2LkM2vzlP8VnWqxY9ecu3_NuXOoaqt9X6uqqWdCBvy8fO4jzN0ldqHsSeAufLcxxmNYrmM1R2zbvXsn9Fe72SGkjO940nzPPiF8ytZ41Dyht0Hje4K2liRv_L8jf3oZMbfTLlG3G3hjDNsVgJw/s2048/MV5BMjE0MDEyNzUwNV5BMl5BanBnXkFtZTgwMDgyMTkyMjE@._V1_.jpg" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1362" data-original-width="2048" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjOE346SytvNipw7FNvnsnkK0KaWZLu6AGf-IKc5bxL2LkM2vzlP8VnWqxY9ecu3_NuXOoaqt9X6uqqWdCBvy8fO4jzN0ldqHsSeAufLcxxmNYrmM1R2zbvXsn9Fe72SGkjO940nzPPiF8ytZ41Dyht0Hje4K2liRv_L8jf3oZMbfTLlG3G3hjDNsVgJw/w400-h266/MV5BMjE0MDEyNzUwNV5BMl5BanBnXkFtZTgwMDgyMTkyMjE@._V1_.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>Movies like “Into the Storm” are an endurance test – not merely for the attention span of the audience, but for the patience of minds like mine that are exhausted by repeated visits to the tired and storm-battered corners of middle America. They seem to be manufactured rather than made, assembled out of parts of any number of pictures that highlight the framework, then spliced together by hands that have been convinced they can still pass as solid entertainment in a culture that has ready access to their older (and often better) predecessors. Only occasionally will they be dressed up in the skin of something novel, although there always remains the question of purpose: if the source was good enough to redo in the first place, what are the odds of doing it better a second time? For a good way through this latest excursion in volatile tornado alley, I was at least cautious in my disdain: perhaps under new direction, through the “found footage” camera lens that is a go-to for just about all things, something more interesting could be done with the concept of ambitious disaster pictures. But fate, alas, is not on anyone’s side here – least of all those watching it all happen. When a character holding a camera up to his face announces “this is the biggest tornado I’ve ever seen” while foolishly standing just a few yards from its swirling vortex, I had not fear or concern for him: only the hope that he would get sucked up and the movie would be over. <span><a name='more'></a></span><p></p><p>The brief opening scene sets the tone. Four teenagers are inside a car, excited by an impending school event, when the weather around them turns into a violent frenzy that involves downed power lines and nearby lightning strikes. One of the passengers leaves the vehicle to catch close-ups of the chaos on his camera. The others beg and plead for him to come back inside. He does, although it is of little value to him: off in the distance down the road, their car is pulled into a cyclone that tosses them around violently, and the camera goes blank as their screams are stifled by a loud crash. Tornado season, it seems, has just begun in the deep south, and these are its first casualties. How convenient for the rest of the characters that they, too, will be carrying around film devices just as the next series of storms arrives.</p><p>The central arc of the film is about a team of storm chasers known as Titus, who have arrived in Oklahoma at the height of the season just as a cluster of storms begin to converge over the open plains (“the system will cover five states!”). The team’s leader Pete Moore (Matt Walsh), apparently obsessed with the anomaly, always seems to be in a miserable mood as he barks orders and condescends to amateur cameramen. Some of his harshest is directed at Alison (Sarah Wayne Callies), a meteorologist along for the excursion, who overhears him in one early scene angrily confessing on the phone that she is too unqualified to work for him. Not that she finds the scenario all that ideal in the first place, either; in between assessing radar maps and exchanging hostile barbs with Pete over the correct locations of impending funnel clouds, she is usually video chatting with a young daughter caught in that familiar quandary of absent parents: wondering when dear old mommy is going to come see her again after a long absence.</p><p>Another subplot, meanwhile, involves the strained relationship of Gary (Richard Armitage), the vice principal of a local high school, and his son Donnie (Max Deacon), who feels invisible unless his father has something harsh or disrespectful to say. That their family is naturally at odds because of the apparent untimely death of the mother is hardly a surprising revelation, and all the obligatory tension is observed through a camera held by Trey (Nathan Kress), Donnie’s brother, who sarcastically editorializes what he sees while others are barely listening. Why is there a camera at all, you ask? Because he and his brother are on dual assignments with the school board: to collect footage for a local time capsule, and film the outdoor graduation that will occur later that same day. Still fuming from his last encounter with dear old dad, however, Donnie abandons his post to go spend time with Kaitlyn (Alycia-Debnam-Carey), a high school crush, who conveniently persuades him into a shabby abandoned factory just outside of town with him right before the sirens in town start blaring on the loud speaker.</p><p>Where are we going with it all? Common disaster movie law dictates that the prospective witnesses must not be happy or docile people leading up to the tragedy, otherwise that would negate the dramatic potential of them being trapped in nearly fatal situations that require them to race against the clock to save one another. Sometimes, there might be some comic relief involved, such as when “2012” included a wacko conspiracy theorist or when “Independence Day” featured a middle-aged loudmouth whose personal vendetta led him into the crosshairs of the mother ship. It all adds to the variety, they say. “Into the Storm” answers that necessity with two social media daredevils named Donk and Reeves, who film themselves in all sorts of death-defying stunts for their YouTube channel while shouting colorful analogies into the microphone. Do they seek shelter when they know a deadly twister is headed their way? Of course not – they simply smile in glee and roar happily against the wind while the natural monstrosity crosses their vantage point, because you know, living on the edge in the face of mortal danger is the greatest formula for making a viral sensation on the Internet.</p><p>Somehow, someway, all the people and their personal stories and grudges will converge, because the movie will require them to – all while they are holding onto their cameras so that us lucky viewers have the opportunity to watch every moment and detail, right down to revealing secrets, private confessions and even near-death experiences. Ignoring the fact that it would ever be feasible to catch enough footage to piece together a cogent story here, however unconsciously, let’s examine the improbability of one of the movie’s most principal scenes: the climactic highlight. In a critical moment when several vortexes collide in on one another, essentially creating a super-tornado with wind speeds greater than 300 miles per hour, how is everyone close to the action able to hold onto their equipment without it blowing away? The race culminates with all the key players huddled together in a storm drain while the center of the tornado itself rages directly above them, yet not one of the camera vantage points ever falters. No, not even when the Titus vehicle itself, possessing drills that can hold it in place in winds nearly up to that speed, is effortlessly blown away from the scene of the carnage, do the devices ever get compromised. Are these cameramen at all, or actually superheroes with an iron grip in disguise?</p><p>Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know what you’re going to say. “But David, it’s just a silly, harmless disaster movie. Lighten up.” If it’s the disaster you come for, you might find your enthusiasm tempered. The tornados themselves are badly modulated, appearing as little more than CGI blobs that would look more right at home in arcade games. Close-ups are intentionally distorted and swift, because a stable shot might reveal the implausibility of the visual. Characters also tend to stand between the camera and the action, as if their half-hearted narration might conceal the certainty of what’s behind them. It’s all so pedestrian and forced, like a version of “Twister” with only a fraction of the budget. You don’t have any substantial fun at these kinds of outings – you only get headaches. That is ultimately the legacy we are left with in this genre in an age where it is no longer acceptable for the disaster itself to be middling or average. As they get bigger and more destructive, their scope surpasses the abilities of ordinary studio budgets. That is perhaps what made the found footage idea seem so appealing to the filmmakers of “Into the Storm.” You can cut corners and have a reasonable explanation for it. Never mind the fact that if a tornado was really that powerful, no footage would survive long enough for us to see it in the first place.</p><p>Written by DAVID KEYES</p><div><div>Disaster/Action (US); 2014; Rated PG-13; Running Time: 89 Minutes</div><div><br /></div><div>Cast:</div><div>Richard Armitage: Gary</div><div>Sarah Wayne Callies: Allison</div><div>Matt Walsh: Pete</div><div>Max Deacon: Donnie</div><div>Nathan Kress: Trey</div><div>Alycia Debnam-Carey: Kaitlyn</div><div><br /></div><div>Produced by Bruce Berman, Richard Brener, Todd Garner, Walter Hamada, Mark McNair, Dave Neustadter, Sean Robins, Jeremy Stein and John Swetnam; Directed by Steven Quale; Written by John Swetnam</div></div>David Keyeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03067794906887523107noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2451838183910864405.post-19148621880102847882023-01-31T20:18:00.004-08:002023-01-31T21:52:33.328-08:00Mandy / * (2018)<p style="text-align: left;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><p><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEicfl5LlCB566AOusuAqe5y1po7IXhkSVqvQFldWVOY5cnSonsXQBhD4VXTsDh-vYaokYlRZWP6QdX2AWjPpjFz_PZGgws1bVSvhRsRgPEP-WjtUcSZ5bf5pnlNfqZKXhZl4WqH-JUYp76kNKx02uFZwmSpU5xUh3lqy1TJ6-cuNHzMOGmVxgiqkBtgiQ/s1200/Mandy-review-1200.jpg" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="675" data-original-width="1200" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEicfl5LlCB566AOusuAqe5y1po7IXhkSVqvQFldWVOY5cnSonsXQBhD4VXTsDh-vYaokYlRZWP6QdX2AWjPpjFz_PZGgws1bVSvhRsRgPEP-WjtUcSZ5bf5pnlNfqZKXhZl4WqH-JUYp76kNKx02uFZwmSpU5xUh3lqy1TJ6-cuNHzMOGmVxgiqkBtgiQ/w400-h225/Mandy-review-1200.jpg" width="400" /></a><span style="text-align: left;">In theory, a movie like “Mandy” would be right up the same alley of brazen gorefests that have been known to captivate my morbid sense of voyeurism. Ripped from the familiar cloth as any number of audacious horror stories set in the lurid world of pulp fiction, the picture makes a bold promise from its very first frame: all that is about to happen will be unlike anything we have witnessed on screen – or, at the bare minimum, fresh enough to draw comparisons to Dario Argento and Mario Bava, the architects of the decadent excess we associate with Giallo. Indeed, countless critics and colleagues have hailed the picture as a triumph of its medium, a surrealistic experience where the framework of the familiar revenge formula is twisted into a fever dream of contemplative symbolism and thematic excess. And who wouldn’t want that, especially nowadays as the genre appears caught somewhere between the extremes of vague nuance and gratuitous overkill?</span><span></span></p><a name='more'></a><p></p></div><p></p><p style="text-align: left;">This was the obligatory spark that drove director Panos Cosmatos down this macabre rabbit hole, leading him to a world where ordinary people don’t merely run or scream their way out of situations, but stand still to bask in the uncertainty of them before their lives are altered by the ordinary impulses of murder and mayhem. Consider poor Mandy herself, for instance. When she is kidnapped by a cult of hyper-religious zealots at the halfway point of the film and then drugged into a paralyzing haze for the purpose of listening to the villain’s monologue, do you think she responds to it all by merely trying to escape or plead her way out? Of course not. That would be too obvious, too mainstream. Instead, she simply stares at him while he disrobes, assesses his physique, and laughs until his rage becomes uncaged. Would John Carpenter or Clive Barker have played the moment this way? Or William Friedkin? This one scene is the entire movie in microcosm, a mirror held up by a filmmaker who is bored by all perfunctory expectations that have led his genre of choice astray in these times of repetition and simplicity.</p><p style="text-align: left;">Where must this all lead now, then? Is there an undiscovered avenue in the labyrinth that still pulsates with fresh sparks? Some have taken the descent and managed to emerge with fresh, uncultivated takes. Cosmatos is not among them. His “Mandy” marks an intriguing turning point in the methods of recent horror, and those who will endure it are not likely to find easy comparisons to other pictures within the genre. But there also comes a point where style and symbolism must be relied on to elevate material instead of engulfing it. The movie is so thick with decadence, so completely absorbed by the unending awe and fascination that comes with the journey, that he is never able to create a tangible connecting point between the audience and the characters. Eventually, we simply find ourselves so frustrated by the meandering detachment of it all that we give up trying to reason with any of it.</p><p style="text-align: left;">The film stars Nicholas Cage and Andrea Riseborough as Red and Mandy, a couple of introverts living life in the quiet wilderness of some undisclosed locale, where they pass time by reading books, watching television, or quietly staring at one another while the other speaks in hushed profundities. They are likable enough, hardly in a position to harm or inspire loathing, but as is the case with all horror movies, comfort rarely lasts long. One day, while she is aimlessly wandering on a highway road near their property, a van belonging to a group of religious nutjobs catches a glimpse of her that spirals into a lethal obsession for Jeremiah (Linus Roache), the cult’s leader. He wants to possess her, capture her, do whatever it takes to absorb her into his lair of eccentric and downtrodden misfits. The desire leads to a bargain they strike with a nocturnal biker gang who are notorious for local abductions in the dead of night, who will deliver Mandy to Jeremiah while simultaneously ensuring Red is bound and gagged safely away from the action.</p><p style="text-align: left;">Still following along? It gets more fascinating. The bikers themselves, who are critical at both ends of the story, may not be mere bikers at all. Perhaps they are not even human. The movie plays it cagey with details, always obscuring their faces and physiques in shadows, while reducing their monosyllabic expressions to what can only be described as metallic growls on the wind. “Blood for Blood,” one of them announces early on, in a raspy inflection that might as well belong to a werewolf. How did they come to be? How did the cult know to hire them for their deadly deed? The uncertainty underlines the material, to inspire our collective fright even while casting doubt on the assurance of people, places and events that hold the movie together.</p><p style="text-align: left;">Needless to say, Mandy’s capture and eventual death will be the engine that drives Red to frenzied vengeance against his new enemies. But what is he up against, really? Certainly not foresighted antagonists, that’s for sure. A religious cult can hardly be expected to possess much common sense, I guess, but in a gathering of half a dozen observers, wouldn’t one of them at least suggest it would be unwise to leave Red alive at the end of captivity? The bindings he is held in are all but easy invites for escape. Other characters emerge for the sake of tonal foreshadowing, including a nomadic hermit who provides storage for Red’s dormant arsenal of battle weapons (how convenient), and an eccentric man in a tin shed who ominously looks at the camera while forecasting what is to come, just before he lets a tiger out of a cage to symbolically provide Red with the metaphor of his coming attack. Also not surprisingly, the establishing shot of the third act sees the lead assessing his hunting ground over a large cliffside, with a valley below surrounded by three high walls and a single entrance. If the movies have taught us anything about revenge over these last several decades, it’s that cornering yourself in when you’re the target of an angry madman doesn’t make for very compelling storytelling.</p><p style="text-align: left;">The movie is all spectacle and no deliberation. Every scene bleeds the aura of self-importance, every shot played up with over emphasis. This becomes monotonous and exhausting when there is nothing substantive holding it together. That is not to say the technical aesthetic is without some level of skill, however. I admired, for example, how Cosmatos strategically edits his character shots, dawdling on individual faces long enough so that their presence has a chance to anchor in our memory. The movie contains a lot of vibrant, refreshing color. The violence, meanwhile, has an alluring magnetism; whole sequences are staged in a way that removes their constraints from reality, so that when two men are essentially sword fighting while holding chainsaws, we can plausibly accept the possibility. The film’s greatest asset? Nearly all the shots are longer than the average jump cuts we associate with modern cinema. The camera intentionally holds focus on set pieces, faces, explanations, ambushes, blood splatters and emotional reactions without regard to time or the average attention span. That is one of the signatures of the great filmmakers like Tarkovsky and Kubrick, who knew that frequently lingering on a single focus was the key to opening the meditative urge of the more intellectual audience. Someday Cosmatos might find himself among those names – hopefully after he reaches a better understanding of balance. </p><div style="text-align: left;">Written by DAVID KEYES</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><div>Horror (US); 2018; Not Rated; Running Time: 121 Minutes</div><div><br /></div><div>Cast:</div><div>Nicholas Cage: Red</div><div>Andrea Riseborough: Mandy</div><div>Linus Roache: Jeremiah</div><div>Ned Dennehy: Brother Swan</div><div>Olwen Fouere: Mother Marlene</div><div>Richard Brake: The Chemist</div><div><br /></div><div>Directed by Panos Cosmatos; Written by Panos Cosmatos, Aaron Stewart-Ahn and Cheddar Goblin; based on a story by Panos Cosmatos</div></div>David Keyeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03067794906887523107noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2451838183910864405.post-38165491885478846032023-01-22T21:31:00.007-08:002023-01-22T21:31:59.052-08:00Terrifier / * (2017)<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg7ynD2bExgtn0Ckl0P7AP6m3ANVUngDMIcS6yMWfAkuf7kyenxLnVZj9b32srsl_FedsQApRmmWvXVullCkn1Z_SrUCioahm9P1lAo2fXYoK6AYJ3wKhKJ-IE4NPuYEnmiYhtV5vaN3W11ySfwAbnhtCXpjup5w8IUk6snESqd0TLVsXTbIf4YVzmWSA/s1920/cba6c284-f061-437b-b73b-cccd199e7f61_1920x1080.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg7ynD2bExgtn0Ckl0P7AP6m3ANVUngDMIcS6yMWfAkuf7kyenxLnVZj9b32srsl_FedsQApRmmWvXVullCkn1Z_SrUCioahm9P1lAo2fXYoK6AYJ3wKhKJ-IE4NPuYEnmiYhtV5vaN3W11ySfwAbnhtCXpjup5w8IUk6snESqd0TLVsXTbIf4YVzmWSA/w400-h225/cba6c284-f061-437b-b73b-cccd199e7f61_1920x1080.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>Marginal movie villains are in copious supply in the films of today, but plausible, convincing ones have become an increasingly rare breed: they now seem to persist more in theory than in practice, where they can be liberated from old formulas and allowed to wreak their sense of chaos in the untamed wilds of a perverse imagination. Once in a great while, one will even find its way in front of a film camera that earns the right to manifest them; if a skilled director or writer has the capacity to evolve their sense of animosity beyond the shackles of the ordinary narrative, we get captivating antagonists like Pennywise, Anton Chigurh and Agent Smith at the center of the chaos. For a brief time during the early minutes of “Terrifier,” we can sense the spark of the latter. Imagine the scene: a mute clown in white and black makeup with bleeding gums and inhuman teeth appears out of the shadows of Halloween night, follows two 20-something women into a late-night pizza parlor and ominously taunts them. Not a word or sound escapes his mouth, although his mannerisms reflect an unhinged insanity brewing beneath the exterior. Later, long after the clown has been tossed out of the establishment for vandalizing the restroom, the girls return to their car and discover their tire has been slashed, setting a chain reaction of events into motion that will end with immeasurable death and blood splattered all over the pavement of a run-down warehouse in the city.<span><a name='more'></a></span><br /><br />The clown, an emaciated figure with dexterous mannerisms that seem inspired by old German expressionism, is a triumph of the psychotic style. For every frame he is on screen, there is a very real sense that he is nothing less than the total personification of evil – or, at the very least, a disturbed man who has lost his complete grip on reality. In one early scene, when the character Tara (Jenna Kanell) announces that his presence in the room gives her the absolute creeps, we sense she is drawing on the same experience that has led us down the same tumultuous path of murderous clowns in the movies: the more menacing and quiet, the greater the danger they must be plotting. That all works well enough for the first act of the movie, until all subsequent scenes become more or less a cop-out of their initial potential as the leads – and then their periphery observers – are lined up to be sacrifices in a cruel visual abattoir. What nerve did writer/director Damien Leone have in creating a convincing maniac just for the sake of feeding him through the mechanics of yet another deplorable torture porn?<p></p><p>The movie plays like a Rob Zombie picture without any of the sly wit underlying the manic violence. A prologue establishes the lurid possibilities: a severely scarred woman named Victoria, apparently the lone survivor of the clown’s own murderous rampage months earlier, appears on live television in an interview about her struggle on that fateful night. Doubts are then raised about the clown’s own death as the dialogue shifts to sensational uncertainty. “His body was never found,” the new anchor informs her. She affirms his death is genuine, but then wanders backstage to brutally attack the anchor after she is overheard making fun of her disfigurement over a phone call. Is the material implying the spirit of the clown lives on in his final victim? Or is the scene just a visual metaphor setting the tone of what is to follow?</p><p>No matter. The movie takes place primarily on Halloween night in one of those indistinct movie cities where narrow streets and dimly lit alleys are sparsely populated, saved for the ones who are destined to become victims of the evil clown. We meet Tara (Scaffidi) and her friend Dawn (Catherine Corcoran), who have just left a party and seek late-night provisions before their trip back home to the suburbs. When Tara glimpses the shadowy form of a figure walking towards them carrying a garbage bag, she is brought to unease: the man is dressed from head-to-toe in elaborate clown costuming and makeup, with a face that looks at her with almost vengeful glee. Dawn, still buzzed from the night of drinking, playfully banters with her friend (“it’s just a man in a costume”). When the two wind up sitting in a late-night pizza joint, the clown follows them in and takes a seat at the opposite table, and what follows is a tense exchange that seems agonizingly long, ending with a decisive moment where he is kicked out of the store just before the girls leave. A few minutes later, the clown returns to exact his revenge on the restaurant workers, whose faces will be stabbed repeatedly in extreme close-up.</p><p>A similar fate must fall upon the girls as well, but not before a laundry list of randomized circumstances leads them to the company of further potential victims. After realizing they are stranded in the city without a spare tire, Tara calls upon her sister Victoria (Samantha Scaffidi) to come and retrieve them. Afterwards, needing to urinate, she begs to use the restroom at a nearby warehouse being watched over by Mike (Matt McAllister), an exterminator who is bugging the place for a rat infestation. While inside, she also encounters a disoriented homeless woman who mistakes her for a new tenant in the building, all while cradling a doll she believes is her newborn baby. At first, the movie establishes a misleading suspicion that all these additional players, minor or otherwise, might be culprits in the ensuing mayhem (notice how Dawn accuses the exterminator, for instance, of looking “more creepy than the clown”). These turn out to be red herrings, alas; each supporting character is no more dangerous to the girls or their safety than a mere gust of wind. Could it have been any other way, though? In a movie where an abnormal maniac has just savagely murdered two men at a restaurant, even a legitimately dangerous bystander might have seemed innocuous in comparison.</p><p>The violence, meanwhile, is cut with a frenetic regularity that does little to obscure the grim details. In just 85 minutes of screen time, Leone holds us hostage in his macabre carnival of beheadings, beatings, rippings, scalpings, cruel cat-and-mouse games and cannibalism without much restriction, all seemingly for the unspoken amusement of his villain, who appears brought to euphoric ecstasy every time a wound gushes or a scream is emitted. Some of this, I reckon, might have worked with fewer close-ups or less prominent lighting. That has been the saving grace of many a horror film that tow the line of visual overkill. But “Terrifier” no more knows restraint than it understands basic tonal modulation. The material is presented in a flat and unvarnished style. One whopper of a scene illustrates this reality more vividly than all others: while the two girls are held at the mercy of the clown just before he decides to end their suffering, he commits an act on one of them so utterly heinous that I question the sanity of anyone who might see it as rousing entertainment. What is its purpose? To frighten? To create paralyzing despair? Or to simply depress? The movie no more knows its intention than it understands the nuance or finesse of a credible build-up.</p><p>And what of David Howard Thornton, the poor performer caught at the center of it all? He is too promising an actor to be squandered in scenes this irredeemable. Reportedly inspired by the mime technique for the portrayal, his is a prowess that lives and breathes the unblinking menace of the role. You admire him almost as highly as you loathe the material. Where can he go from here? One hopes in a completely different orbit than the one “Terrifier” gravitates on. Not that it would be very hard to take much of a step up from the experience, either. Just imagine what a career retrospective for him might look like in the years ahead, long after he’s made a notable name for himself in Hollywood. Would a movie this misguided even be worth a mention? One could arguably justify its existence as a warning to upcoming actors, especially those who hope to avoid launching their careers in the comforts of pointless trash.</p><div>Written by DAVID KEYES<br /><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><b><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Horror/Thriller
(US); 2017; Rated R; Running Time: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">85 Minutes</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><u><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Cast:<br /></span></u></b><b><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Jenna Kanell: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Tara Heyes<br /></span><b><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Samantha Scaffidi: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Victoria Heyes<br /></span><a name="_Hlk125313818"><b><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">David Howard Thornton</span></b></a><b><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Art the Clown<br /></span><b><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Catherine Corcoran: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Dawn<br /></span><b><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Pooya Mohseni: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Cat Lady<br /></span><b><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Matt McAllister: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Mike the Exterminator</span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Written and directed by </span></span></b><span style="font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Damien Leone</span></p></div>David Keyeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03067794906887523107noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2451838183910864405.post-43770325285781483932022-08-02T15:57:00.002-07:002022-08-02T16:09:55.720-07:00Jurassic World: Dominion / ** (2022)<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjYNm-AKyXugeC3X-UHvoQh9jikuUsVAaSb9lTDOt7H7eqwwesIX0Wf3wYE33lwu4-gS8CrGWStxfqyTfpQKRVJJb05NRRPoFgd6TScPW4RJxMSRatu2w021DGuD7_1iH7JuiDZbFfbd3IoMiQ5VBvcB8jDC29mKIQ7iO2Frkj3ijHNZ-BWws0q3FWitg/s3000/09jurassic1-videoSixteenByNine3000.jpg" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1688" data-original-width="3000" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjYNm-AKyXugeC3X-UHvoQh9jikuUsVAaSb9lTDOt7H7eqwwesIX0Wf3wYE33lwu4-gS8CrGWStxfqyTfpQKRVJJb05NRRPoFgd6TScPW4RJxMSRatu2w021DGuD7_1iH7JuiDZbFfbd3IoMiQ5VBvcB8jDC29mKIQ7iO2Frkj3ijHNZ-BWws0q3FWitg/w400-h225/09jurassic1-videoSixteenByNine3000.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>In many ways, you have to grin gleefully at the great audacity of Colin Trevorrow’s “Jurassic World: Dominion,” a movie that feels less like a fatalist dinosaur picture and more akin to chase capers like James Bond or Indiana Jones. Not content to center the action on any sort of enclosed setting, his premise sets us up for all the big obligatory tropes of modern blockbusters: lots of locales, intersecting casts, intrigue, big secrets beneath all the hurried dialogue, tugs of old nostalgia, uncertain villains, climactic twists overloaded on coincidence, seemingly unrelated narrative angles that can be shoe-horned into the broader arc, and wide-scale action sequences that bookend every detail. Oh, and then there’s the dinosaurs. Some are old, others – many others – are new. You almost expect that of a series that has become saturated in wall-to-wall ambushes with the prehistoric monsters, but rarely have they been so numerous, or indeed so accessible. Yet our eyes can barely keep them straight as their prospective prey shuffle between locations ranging from Malta, the Heartland of the Americas and even to the snowy peaks of a forest reserve in northern Italy. That might have been forgivable in a story more focused on a single purpose. Such a story was probably lost in very early drafts of this convoluted screenplay.<span><a name='more'></a></span><br /><br />How did it all go haywire? Where was the moment when this idea swelled beyond controllable chaos? Perhaps it’s all a matter of the clashing values of movie eras. When this series began, the enormity of Michael Crichton’s literary idea was anchored by the steadier hands of filmmakers of the pre-Marvel Hollywood, before manic editing and long-winded narrative structure overtook the momentum of mainstream action. Those movies, to their credit, paused long enough to gaze back at the material with some sense of joy. But gone are the sensations of the impossible, the awe of the dinosaurs that inspired them. They have been rendered superficial props in premises that let them wander without borders among the ordinary population, who exploit them in black markets and hunting parties for the sole purpose of setting up ambitious chase sequences. Some of them, admittedly, are pitched with skill. Consider one in which characters are attempting to safely land a helicopter inside the dinosaur refuge, but their protective radar fails, and the flying lizards proceed to disassemble the vehicle in mid-air. The scene could have been photographed and edited to the point of desensitizing nonsense, but Trevorrow is surprisingly fixated on the intensity of the moment. He has an eye for this sort of sensation. If only his story didn’t allow it all to be circumvented by nonsense.<br /><br />The film opens well after the climax of the last, where the dinosaurs have no taken to throwing off the food chain after being set loose on the mainland. A new species of mutant locusts begins terrorizing crop fields in the North American heartland, an apparent phenomenon that can lead to widespread famine as the food chain suffers irreparable damage. Is that intentional? Or just nature descending further into chaos after the return of the dinosaurs? Ellie Sattler (Laura Dern) suspects the masterminds of Jurassic World are somehow behind the matter, and that leads her to the guiding hand of old friend Alan Grant (Sam Neil), who is still digging up old fossils in the desert – primarily, we deduce, because it provides him an escape from the madness of the world outside.<br /><br />Their prospective collaboration is instantly fueled by all the redundant curiosities of Ian Malcolm (Jeff Goldblum), who initiates contact with them about the locusts while he is lecturing for Biosyn, the corporation that owns the wildlife reserve that now protects most of the captured dinosaurs (convenient, eh?). Their venture to the reserve comes attached with all the obligatory touches of nostalgia, but few are the moments in which they can reminisce over their adventures at Jurassic Park. Just beneath their feet, in a random laboratory they gain access to with the help of an inside leak, the prototypes of the locusts are resting peacefully in their temperature-controlled habitat, just waiting for the inevitable moment when they are disturbed by Ellie and Alan and set loose. What any of this fundamentally has to do with the dinosaur arc is anyone’s guess, but hey, when’s the last time you saw a fifth sequel so willing to go for broke?<br /><br />Meanwhile, the primary characters of this more recent trilogy continue their long exile in the unknown, fueled by their possession of Maisie Lockwood (Isabella Sermon), the genetically engineered granddaughter of John Hammond who was introduced in the last film. Her present existence is propelled by two certainties: 1) the villains need her in order to understand her genetic code, and 2) both Owen (Chris Pratt) and Claire (Bryce Dallas Howard) know how important it is to keep her hidden. Angsty teenagers, alas, are rarely content to stay concealed in the wilderness, and somehow she manages to wander into the crosshairs of bounty hunters hired by Biosyn, who whisk her away while her guardians give chase. A more straightforward script would simply take her directly to the culprits. “Jurassic World: Dominion” provides her a travelogue of randomized set pieces, just for the sake of adding in additional supporting characters. The most notable: a rebel pilot named Kayla (DeWanda Wise), whose loyalties are vague only as far as the story takes them; after a long chase scene involving bloodthirsty raptors from the black market of Malta, her allegiance comes around to Owen and Claire, who request transport back to the reserve to stop whatever awaits Maisie in those underground labs. <br /><br />Eventually, of course, both stories must converge. That’s the way it all works now in this time of “Avengers”-style action epics: all the key characters and their varying unrelated conflicts must share a moment where they come face-to-face with one another, partake in a long-winded dialogue about their binding hatred of corporate scientists, discover their common enemy and then unite in one ambitious plunge to a climactic encounter with the overzealous antagonist. Traditionalists would argue a villain was never needed, that the greatest enemy in a park overrun with engineered dinosaurs is the arrogance to assume they ought to be brought back in the first place. You know and I know it, but something about that conclusion has been lost in the translation. What we get here, instead, is a corporate shill named Lewis Dodgson (Campbell Scott), who spends most of his time wandering through white hallways and sterile board rooms looking important while barking orders and waxing fatalistic with Henry Wu (BD Wong), who drones on morosely about his part in the decline of present civilization. Where was the inspiration in this screenplay? The nerve to draw a dimensional figure at the head of all this anarchy?<br /><br />I don’t know whether to blame the writers or the editor for the offense that is the movie’s final twenty minutes, where all comes crashing down as the locusts are nearly incinerated by Dodgson, escape into the atmosphere, burn the nearby forests to a cinder, frighten the dinosaurs into flight, inspire conventional outbursts and encourage the mastermind of it all to… flee through a dark tunnel alone in the dead of night while dinosaurs are lurking around inside? The movie robs us of a critical thematic underline. It’s all thoughtless action – sound and fury, signifying nothing. On one hand, you can probably accuse the script of short-changing us when the momentum is there for a juice final confrontation. But what if it was actually shot, then just cut out for the sake of time? At a lengthy 147 minutes, with a prospective “extended” version coming sometime later this year, one wonders exactly how much missing exposition is floating around on the cutting room floor. Is there a more sound reasoning in those missing minutes? Something that could have justified the divergent plot paths a little better? The movie is a rare glimpse into the hazards of overthinking one’s concept without actually explaining it coherently.<br /><br />The ending, likewise, is a cop-out, especially when you consider how it is touted as the proposed “final chapter” of this saga. I call baloney. It’s not just a matter of an open-ended plot that is irritating, either. Pay close attention to the voice-over occurring in those final shots, and think to yourself what it all comes down to. Somehow, in some absurd way, Trevorrow is playing the role of the dimwitted idealist, driven by an illogical rationalization that violates the very core of what drove this story in the first place. I wonder what Crichton would have thought of the monologue, had he lived long enough to hear it. One wonders if he might have regretted penning the source material if he knew how it would go so elaborately wrong.<p></p><div>Written by DAVID KEYES</div><div><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Action/Adventure/Sci-Fi (US); 2022;
Rated PG-13 </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt;">for intense sequences of
action, some violence and language;<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">
Running Time: </b>147 Minutes</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><u style="font-weight: bold;">Cast:</u><br /></span></p><div style="text-align: left;"><b style="font-weight: bold; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Chris Pratt: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt; text-align: justify;">Owen Grady<br /></span><b style="font-weight: bold; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Bryce Dallas Howard: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt; text-align: justify;">Claire Dearing<br /></span><b style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Laura Dern: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt; text-align: justify;">Ellie Sattler<br /></span><b style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Sam Neill: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt; text-align: justify;">Alan Grant<br /></span><b style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Jeff Goldblum: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt; text-align: justify;">Ian Malcolm<br /></span><b style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;">DeWanda Wise: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt; text-align: justify;">Kayla Watts<br /></span><b style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Mamoudou Athie: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt; text-align: justify;">Ramsay Cole<br /></span><b style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Isabella Sermon: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt; text-align: justify;">Maisie Lockwood<br /></span><b style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Campbell Scott: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt; text-align: justify;">Lewis Dodgson<br /></span><b style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;">BD Wong: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt; text-align: justify;">Henry Wu</span></div><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Directed by </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Colin Trevorrow; <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Written by </b>Emily Carmichael and Colin
Trevorrow</span></p></div>David Keyeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03067794906887523107noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2451838183910864405.post-35457002089740327112021-09-26T17:56:00.001-07:002021-09-26T17:56:04.765-07:00Taxi Driver / **** (1976)<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj2KT9hUUJyst9wrv5BwBEqSgu5nFM2rcjSfXVKZcGjJyjFp_JmvtVeRUFnV6Q2KFXrJNWf7VdzOv1kbP7fdnGoLnLFWzMN353UZ-mY8D5VBaukmCygsrtNBpTPSItpUA3YTsQwY69nbMI1/s800/image-w1280.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="450" data-original-width="800" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj2KT9hUUJyst9wrv5BwBEqSgu5nFM2rcjSfXVKZcGjJyjFp_JmvtVeRUFnV6Q2KFXrJNWf7VdzOv1kbP7fdnGoLnLFWzMN353UZ-mY8D5VBaukmCygsrtNBpTPSItpUA3YTsQwY69nbMI1/w400-h225/image-w1280.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>Like the most notable of cynical movie narrators, Travis Bickle arrives in “Taxi Driver” less an observer and more a force of nature nearing the breaking point of his stability. What separates him from a breed of other loners eager to critique the system is how far he is willing to go in dismantling it. This is not a man who gazes directly at the cultural construct of 1970s New York with pragmatism, and when he becomes driven to shake up its foundation, each choice plays like a step further away from a tangible moral center. In many instances that can be amusing to watch, at least when the results are uncomfortable rather than dangerous. Consider his interaction with women: early on he attempts to earn the interest of Betsy (Cybill Shepherd), a political volunteer for an aspiring presidential candidate. At first she is just as amused by his blunt worldview as we are, until their first date ends up in a seedy theater showing porno. Now contrast that to how he approaches Iris (Jodie Foster), a 12-year-old prostitute whose eyes seem to plead for him to save her – admirable, perhaps, if you were to just passively observe the behavior. But while his is a pattern that is the staple of many movie characters whose madness walks in the guise of noble intentions, rarely are they this frontal, or so pointed in arriving at the core of the crumbling psyche.<p></p><p><span></span></p><a name='more'></a><p></p><p>Bickle remains one the most fascinating of all antiheroes in American cinema, even in this sardonic age of Patrick Batemans, Lester Burnhams, Tyler Durdens and William Fosters, when Hollywood has made relentless use of the corrupt male paradigm. He is also one of the few we have reservations in admitting a kinship with, a fact that is influenced by a series of decisions he makes that go far beyond acceptable in the violent third act. In 2002, back when I first saw the movie in film school, it was less difficult to explain the admiration; movie buffs were still content with the figurative explanations of character motives instead of being appalled by their literal outcomes. We recognized the reasons for bad behavior. But in this climate of hyper-awareness there becomes a need, an obligation, to attach those assertions with explanatory footnotes. The narrator in Scorsese’s movie is a product of untold experiences in the shadow of Vietnam, and the unrestrained torment that came with city life when back alleys were synonymous with filth and sleaze and streetlights gave clarity to a grotesque underbelly. His are eyes that move to the rhythms entirely out of his control. A monster lurks below the surface, but it is a shell that we understand, relate to, and empathize with.</p><p>While these undercurrents run thick in many of Scorsese’s early pictures, “Taxi Driver” dares to elevate the scathing observer into the heart of the common moviegoer. More than just indicative of the evolving values of a young Hollywood auteur, they became the pointed philosophies of Paul Schrader, a then-novice screenwriter who is more often attributed to the movie’s success than most scribes had been (at least up to that point). Schrader, who would transition to directing and go on to make “American Gigolo,” “Affliction” and the recent “First Reformed,” was in many ways announcing his nuanced arrival in the volatile theater of human pain, showing us the complete and unfiltered worldview of declining social norms in the diseased heart of Americana. When we see his later films, what we are experiencing is evolved variations of the same underlying thread that illuminates Bickle, and all the volcanic anger that is destined to build with it.</p><p>The movie is deliberately cagey with how he arrived there. The early scenes, containing expository exchanges with an interviewer at the New York taxi service, reveal that he was “honorably discharged” from the marines in 1973. The questions are brief and succinct: we also learn he is a raging insomniac and seeks long overnight shifts, when the hustle and bustle of New York has died down and lowly degenerates come out to stalk the shadows. Those first nights show him grinding to that routine ad nauseum: he picks up drunkards and low-lives, watches passively on in the rear-view mirror while they have sex or do drugs in his backseat, and returns the cab to the docks the next morning after cleaning away the filth they have left behind. His commonality with them is not an enthusiasm or an endorsement, of course; they are simply easier to disappear among, and the silence allows him to build on his caustic hatred, usually through rambling internal monologues. When he refers to himself as “god’s lonely man,” there is a chord of film noir in his tone. But he is not content to hide or even nurse his wounds in private, a key distinction that also informs what was to come of neo-noir, where the protagonists are usually acting out their struggles instead of festering in them.</p><p>Occasionally, the taxi’s backseat guests are more than just superfluous distractions. One of the watersheds of his eventual fate appears in the form of a disgruntled husband (played in cameo by Scorsese himself), who instructs Bickle to park near a residential street and sit there with him (“did I tell you to stop the meter?!”). His voice demands that he look up at the corner window, where he spots the silhouette of a woman smoking. That is his passenger’s wife, but the room is not of his house – it belongs to another, and the man outlines how he is going to use a 47 magnum on each of her orifices as revenge for cheating on him. The grotesque and painstaking description ought to horrify Bickle in the same way it inspires dread in the audience, but something about his face implies there may be commonality in the decision. This is a man who is fighting back, against someone who has wronged him. It is a cycle that will inform the actions that are to come in the taxi man’s own psychological descent.</p><p>Shortly thereafter, Travis arrives at a seedy hotel room to purchase a gun at the suggestion of a co-worker (a “means of protection” is the obligatory excuse). When he arrives to assess his choices from the dealer, he purchases the entire lot. Between more strange encounters with low-lives and serendipitous circumstances that led him to the unlikely meeting with young Iris, he spends long and tedious hours rigging an elaborate system of wires and leather straps to conceal as many of his guns as possible under an overcoat, usually while news bulletins about the prospective presidential candidate are playing on a nearby television. Roleplay is the tool that allows him to perfect the art of a quick draw, and practice constitutes a key verbalization: the famous scene when Bickle pretends he is being accosted by an invisible person and announces to the camera, “Are you talking to me?”</p><p>In the long list of alienated Vietnam veterans in the movies, someone seems to always be talking from within. A few manifest it into self-loathing, while others attack every detail in their line of vision. Bickle allows it to rot the core of his soul under a facade of false courtesy and generic platitudes. The private gunplay, in many respects, is the coping mechanism that will allow him to break away from the routine he dwells in, and Iris’ arrival is the catalyst that will propel him beyond the boundaries of law and order. There are two scenes that flawlessly emphasize this inevitability, one blatant and the other incidental. The more obvious cue comes when Bickle meets Iris for the second time in a motel room. She fails to remember who he is, even though his recollection is vivid: they met days earlier in a chance encounter in his cab, when she attempted to flee from her domineering pimp (Harvey Keitel) before he whisked her away. Now she is less concerned with escaping the life she has chosen, but is that all an elaborate lie? Is she really wanting to stay, or is she too afraid to say, especially to a man she believes may just become unhinged for the sake of saving her? His dialogue is sharp, damning and somehow encouraging. But she knows exactly what it all must mean: if she takes his help, the only means to that end may involve the shedding of blood.</p><p>The other scene, a bridge between Bickle’s failed interaction with Betsy and his eventual pursuit of Iris, is the moment where all the foreshadowing culminates. Unbeknownst to him for the first minutes of his fare, Travis has picked up both Charles Palantine, the prospective presidential candidate, and his assistant, after they have failed to secure a limousine for a fundraising event. When the realization dawns on him who exactly the man is, he engages as an enthusiastic fan, showering him with praise as his candidacy seeks to topple the country’s incumbent in the upcoming election. Palantine is flattered but taken aback after asking his driver about what he feels should be done about crime in the city. The ensuing monologue is a biting, scathing reveal of the monster at the wheel, and to this day I am marveled by how subtle both Leonard Harris and De Niro are in handling the chilling awkwardness of the exchange. Palantine comes to know this man as a ticking time bomb without any drastic change of expression, and Bickle is so chilly and nonchalant about his delivery, as if it is the root of a philosophy that is more normal than horrific.</p><p>Performances elevate this material because they refuse to operate by the conventional emotional cues of crime thrillers. Foster was a newcomer to hard-boiled drama when she took on the role of a teenage prostitute, having been typecast consistently as a sarcastic fast talker in a handful of Disney comedies, but her brand of bemused distance provides the movie with great moral complexity; we can never be sure if Iris is really struggling inside, or is wearing a mask to keep those around her guessing about her choices. Also effective is Cybil Shepherd as Betsy, the volunteer who will continue to have curious encounters with Bickle as the movie progresses, and Albert Brooks as her protective friend is caustic and observant without being the scene-chewer we associate him with in later roles. De Niro was not new to film or even Scorsese’s brand prior to the movie, but his conviction as Bickle allows his rising star to explode, before eventually being elevated to transcendence in “Raging Bull” just two years later. When one stands back to assess the pitch they bring to the material, one finds a menagerie of fresh and eager faces buying into a new wisdom emerging from Scorsese’s youthful doctrine, which suggested the more fascinating people were the ones who willingly played in the back alleys of the big cities.</p><p>The music is just as essential as the dialogue. Bernard Herrmann was in his final years when he agreed to write the music for “Taxi Driver,” having made some of the most famous scores to ever be heard in the golden age (the single sharp chord of the shower scene in “Psycho” may be his most lauded), but his approach here is an alluring if unusual mix of sparse drum riffs and decadent brass instruments that seem inspired by film noir. Listening to them again as the images unfold on screen, I began to sense the genius of the pattern: the more romantic horns play up the illusion of a functioning metropolis, while the minimalist pieces point to the internal solitude of its most dangerous wanderer. For many of Scorsese’s early films, there is always a duality between what he captures and what he perceives: the city itself is an object of beauty burdened by the sins and transgressions of those who occupy it. Herrmann’s music gives the movie a sense of that unspoken purpose, moving between the haunting quiet and the ambitious flourishes in the same way Bickle himself moves between dark alleys and public spectacles on his way towards collapse.</p><p>When that moment comes, it does so in spectacular violence that still inspires shock to this day – Bickle enters the motel where Iris works, and lays waste to every bystander (including her pimp) in an elaborate shootout that ends with him barely clinging to life as the cops arrive. Yet it is the sequence that follows that probably inspires the most debate. After the entire encounter has concluded, Travis awakes to letters from Iris’ parents, thanking him for saving their girl, and he returns to his taxi as a hero, where Betsy is once again drawn to his backseat. At the time, the scene was jarring enough against the backdrop of the rest of the film to inspire running discussions between bewildered viewers, who were either of the opinion that the moment was literal, or simply a fantasy. For either explanation to work, that requires Bickle to survive the ordeal he has been through – an unlikely circumstance in a movie this grim. So how do we account for the happy, gleeful moment? I think the explanation points to Scorsese’s brief intrigue of dream logic. The end of one’s life, we are told, involves flashes back to happier memories before death comes for the chosen, but in the case of a traumatized Vietnam vet who dwells in the muck of the gutters, what possible good memories are there to recall? No, it would be easier for him to picture himself as the brave hero at the end of his bout with violence, instead of as a victim of a shocking outburst. In those final moments, he is relishing what he believes might have come had he survived his ordeal, and the movie ends as it begins: with those slow, hypnotic glimpses beyond the windshield of a city hiding behind the glare of streetlights. The great mystery of the movie is how it deals so cleverly with the uncertain subconscious of its characters, and yet always seems to be telling us the absolute truth in every frame.</p><p>Written by DAVID KEYES</p><p><b style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Drama/Crime (US); 1976; Rated R; Running
Time: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt; text-align: justify;">114 Minutes<br /></span></p><div style="text-align: justify;"><b style="font-size: 10pt; text-align: left;"><u><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;"><br />Cast:<br /></span></u></b><b style="font-size: 10pt; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Robert De Niro: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt; text-align: left;">Travis Bickle<br /></span><b style="font-size: 10pt; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Jodie Foster: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt; text-align: left;">Iris<br /></span><b style="font-size: 10pt; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Cybill Shepherd: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt; text-align: left;">Betsy<br /></span><b style="font-size: 10pt; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Albert Brooks: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt; text-align: left;">Tom<br /></span><b style="font-size: 10pt; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Harvey Keitel: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt; text-align: left;">Sport<br /></span><b style="font-size: 10pt; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Peter Boyle: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt; text-align: left;">Wizard<br /><div style="text-align: left;"><b style="font-size: 10pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;"><br />Produced by </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt; text-align: justify;">Phillip M. Goldfarb,
Julia Phillips and Michael Phillips; <b>Directed
by </b>Martin Scorsese;<b> Written by </b>Paul
Schrader</span></div></span></div><p></p>David Keyeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03067794906887523107noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2451838183910864405.post-82545840336794746182021-07-16T15:26:00.001-07:002021-07-22T16:25:36.807-07:00"The Shining" Revisited<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgJ5MyRjmxn3QmFh0HbFudftpeyAObpy2V3dPQUF2XPflgR6t-omCaKpWJ8O8efK0hdHyb-LDN55EflWBSNI7jVdqg_3iYbo9K8IS5aIzrU5s40kiP-HR6ZnQfjtvml1f99oC4JZrf75Jdp/s1200/the-shining-1-1.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="627" data-original-width="1200" height="334" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgJ5MyRjmxn3QmFh0HbFudftpeyAObpy2V3dPQUF2XPflgR6t-omCaKpWJ8O8efK0hdHyb-LDN55EflWBSNI7jVdqg_3iYbo9K8IS5aIzrU5s40kiP-HR6ZnQfjtvml1f99oC4JZrf75Jdp/w640-h334/the-shining-1-1.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><p>What is it about the Overlook Hotel that casts such an ominous cloud? How do the mysterious, inexplicable events surrounding a small and isolated family affect the terror they inflict on one another? These are just two of the broad questions hovering over a long mystery in “The Shining,” a movie of ageless dexterity that also remains one of the more fascinating case studies in academic film analysis. When it arrived in theaters over four decades ago, the conventional wisdom at the time had been swift and dismissive: the exacting hand of one Stanley Kubrick had lost sight of a cogent vision, supplementing the famous source material by Stephen King with so much surrealistic ambiguity and nonsense that he had released a labyrinthian mess instead of a probing psychological essay. But much like his own “A Clockwork Orange” and “2001: A Space Odyssey,” time has offered a generous reassessment, and now the picture is usually seen hovering towards the top of most lists of the greatest horror movies ever made. When I first encountered it at the age of 15, my admiration for its technical skill and tone were undermined by an inability to decipher the clues. What was happening to the Torrance family? Were they being haunted by ghosts, pitted against one another by elaborate mind games? Would they have been seen if the young boy at the center of the action were not clairvoyant? Or were they simply imagined by people whose sanity had been compromised by isolation? Over 20 years and dozens of viewings later, I can finally speak with confidence on some of the great paradoxes the story weaves.<span></span></p><a name='more'></a>The primary key to Kubrick’s riddle, I believe, exists in the material involving mirrors. The most obvious occurs in a bathroom behind the hotel bar, where Jack Torrance (Jack Nicholson) has gone to drown his sorrows in the third act after an explosive confrontation with his wife. As the Gold Room fills with the enthusiasm of countless flappers and socialites, a waiter crashes into him and spills a tray of drinks all over his jacket. They wander into a nearby restroom to clean the stain, and their dialogue is insufferably formal to the point of discomfort. Then, Jack’s eyes arrive at a great and devious realization: the waiter is actually Mr. Grady, one of the former caretakers, who eight years prior murdered his entire family before committing suicide with a shotgun. How is his presence possible? Because the hotel, of course, vibrates with paranormal energies that spill over into reality, and a critical detail offered by the hotel manager at the start of the film foreshadows his eventual arrival. It is the mirror in the restroom that is the bridge between planes of existence: it offers him a physical gateway into Jack’s consciousness, much in the same way it allows other details earlier in the film to take root in the eyes of the characters.<br /><br />We accept this explanation based on a thread that subconsciously occurs throughout the movie, across scenes established in the same reality. A vision of a bloody elevator flooding a hallway, created by young Danny (Danny Lloyd) when he is talking to his imaginary friend in the bathroom mirror. A scene shot from the perspective of reflection in a bedroom, after the family has set up shop in the hotel and Wendy (Shelley Duvall) brings Jack his breakfast (notice how his eyes seem possessed by malevolence). A shot of an empty liquor cabinet in the bar with a reflective backdrop, which Jack stares into before manifesting the vision of Lloyd, his trusted bartender. The startling switcheroo that occurs in Room 237, when Jack stumbles upon an attractive woman in the bathtub, embraces her, then turns to the mirror to notice he is holding the bloated and decaying body of an old lady. All this eventually culminates with the famous “Redrum” shot, when Wendy finally realizes her son’s moniker is actually a warning observed in reverse. The finality of the gesture becomes obvious with one sharp zoom-in towards the word in question: what is confusing in reality makes brutal sense when you gaze it from the opposing angle.<br /><br />These are not ruses or coincidences for a filmmaker who took perverse pleasure in creating obscure patterns, dismantling ordinary narrative structure and leaving behind frustrating loose ends. “The Shining” endures, in part, because so much of the open-ended uncertainty can simply be found by stumbling upon it. There is never a moment in which our observations remain precisely the same from one viewing to the next; always, there is another detail coming to light, a framing device that makes itself known, a common bond that we did not detect before, or a reconsideration of the underlying exchanges that occur somewhere between dialogue and behavior. Unlike so many horror movies that feel as if they have been permanently carved into a fixed state, Kubrick’s movie remains eternally alive on screen, always in flux as age and wisdom allow us to take different roads and find more resonating explanations. How marvelous it is to return to those frightening corridors on the 40th anniversary and find them still so potent on our unsettled algorithms.<br /><br />All the same, you can sense how the initial frustration began. “The Shining” came not just on the cusp of Kubrick’s own descent into stylistic madness but arrived at the onset of the most literal age of horror films in Hollywood, when audiences preferred visual assaults and simplified gorefrests. The chords routinely struck in such pictures were, for the most part, symbols of transparency that could be absorbed and forgotten with minimal effort. You never had to think about what they suggested. Even a film like “Alien,” another famous slow burner of the time, could be accepted with certainty as its notorious monster stalked and murdered members of a space crew. Yet here was a mother, father and son whose only grounding to reality could be described by their reactions. You could scarcely trust what they were seeing was more than figurative. Audiences resented that kind of trickery; it required them to perform mental leaps they were unwilling to make, lest that rob them of the experience to be lazily assaulted by the images ahead of them.<br /><br />The movie does not begin with that insinuation. The first shots follow a lone car overlooking a mountain range as it speeds over a scenic byway, on a destination to something of great importance. The spot: a hotel atop a great peak in Colorado (the establishing shot actually uses Mt. Hood and its Timberline Lodge), where the driver has arrived to be interviewed for the caretaker position. Over the course of a long eight-month venture, he will be assigned to watch over the site and keep its electricity and boilers functional as heavy winter snowfall buries all the nearby roads. His wife and son, of course, will be allowed to stay with him, occupying a room in the servants’ quarters. There is an initial enthusiasm in Jack, who sees the quiet and solitude as a chance to gain focus on the book he hopes to write. The strange and bloody legend of Grady fascinates him but does not dissuade his enthusiasm, perhaps because he is not easily impressed by the legend, or perhaps he is already aware of the details.<br /><br />Danny’s gift for psychic phenomena, seen well before his first step into the Overlook, is an entry point through the supernatural membrane of the story. When he conjures up the vision of the famous bleeding elevator, in fact, it is so terrible and shocking that his own imaginary friend Tony attempts to conceal it from him. Afterwards, the boy collapses and is tended to by a doctor, who is just as startled as we are to learn his shoulder was once dislocated by his father during a drunken rage. Alcoholism and child abuse, of course, were prominent fixtures of the King novel, but Kubrick deliberately glosses over those details because of his disinterest in the humanity. Of course the mother and son will be horrified by what occurs, and of course the father will descend a madness that spills over into unrelenting violence. Those are a given, and none of the actors are destined to play the material without the usual hysteria. But to make the characters relatable is to position the film as an exercise in empathy, and Kubrick wants us to stand on the outside so we can submit to the same exhausting dominance imposed on them.<br /><br />The movie’s plot occurs over roughly six weeks from the point of entry to the eventual mental collapse, but time functions like a drain, dragging everything downward with it. Title cards offer perfunctory indications early on, such as one that reads “A Month Later” after the Torrances have moved in and set up domicile in the hotel, but they become more and more infrequent as the certainty of the terror begins to absorb the material. How am I sure? Because there is no other tangible explanation, for instance, why Jack would wander into a room populated by 1920s partygoers, other than to create a visual link to the movie’s famous final shot of a portrait on a wall containing his face. Others, initially, were befuddled by the implication, especially since it seemed to contradict the shadow cast over them by the Grady murders, which occurred eight years prior to their arrival. I would argue in defense of that confusion if Grady himself had not shown up to a party that itself must have occurred fifty years prior to his suicide. What the anomaly suggests, I feel, is that negative energy of the past is not bound by age or era, and when it gathers in the mind’s eye of the living, they too are taken out of the time continuum.<br /><br />Notice how that also affects their collective visions. In her final flight from a murderous husband, Wendy catches glimpses of strangers in nearby rooms, dressed as if they belonged to the flapper society. Or one where she is greeted by a partygoer smiling at her, despite having a bleeding wound on his forehead. Or the moment towards the end where she, too, shares the vision of the bleeding elevator, now seemingly brought to literal manifestation after Danny had experienced it early on. Is she sharing in the psychic energies permeating through those corridors? Is the supernatural entity enveloping them all? Or is she psychic too?<br /><br />I doubt the explanation is as complex as we make it. Consider, for example, that Wendy’s own visions are never individual; she only arrives at them after her son, whom she shares a close bond with, conjures them in moments of outright panic (he is being chased by his murderous father when they reach her). Of course she might feed from them instinctively in the same way mothers tend to feel pain experienced by their children, and there is no doubt he is gifted at the concept of “shining.” But how does that explain Jack, who experiences visions as well, and without the influence of his son? The only logical explanation is that the ability has been passed down by heredity, through the father that is now using his gift to channel the evil of the past.<br /><br />There is no apt way to describe the performances other than ethereal. Nicholson, in particular, positions himself at another level of haunting: he is not merely performing for a camera, but looking directly beyond it like a dagger that pierces a barrier between safety and anguish. The Nicholson method is rarely not devious or gleeful, and much of the early material exploits that dexterity. But even a scene like the confrontation at his typewriter must have felt otherworldly, even to him. He snarls with meticulous viscosity, and watch how the unease in Shelly Duvall’s voice is so organically shrill as she attempts to back away from his overwhelming presence. Her own work in the film must have been such a psychological ordeal, given how she and Kubrick reportedly came to verbal altercations repeatedly before each take. Perhaps that was a maneuver to push the ordinarily docile character actress closer towards the mental collapse of her screen persona. However you want to label it in the aftermath of Duvall’s own bouts with depression and instability, what remains carved into the picture frames is a startling gaze towards the absolute agony of performance.<br /><br />Acquiring the full abilities of his actors was but one of many skills buried in the Kubrick arsenal. New technologies were rarely far from his grasp, and his “2001” is still held as the grand standard when it came to perfecting the technical illusion of man engaged with the vacuum. For his venture to the Overlook, it was the remarkable Steadicam that gave him such fresh eyes. When young Danny rides his bike through the various hallways of the hotel and sometimes comes to abrupt stops, watch closely as the frame stops with such great precision. The technique, in truth, is easier than it looks: a handheld camera is kept level with the action in a cameraman’s hand, anchored underneath by weights that ensure the movements of the holder do not cause unnecessary shaking or rattling. The effect only adds emphasis to the notion of evil forces dwelling in the hotel. Perhaps it is not a camera at all that stalks young Danny, but a ghost that observes and guides him towards the confrontations his young psychic mind is not ready to deal with. <br /><br />What nerve did Kubrick have in forging that kind of destiny? What gave him the right to create living, breathing films that did not feel trapped by the boundaries of their own artifice? It is the same nerve that fuels the nightmarish social subtext of “A Clockwork Orange,” the sharp wit of “Dr. Strangelove,” the audacious moral-bending standard of “Lolita,” the discouraging dehumanization of “Full Metal Jacket” and the grotesque pornography of “Eyes Wide Shut” – an ability to work beyond textbook ideas and give his images the heft of hypnotic precision. Time and again, it plays like a paradoxical signature in the autobiography of his film style. What does it add up to under the weight of the horror blanket? Only one of the great endurance tests of its time, an elaborate and mysterious psychological puzzle that mirrors the great hedge maze contained in the backdrop of the story’s hotel. <br /><br />I have seen and written about “The Shining” more than any other film in my time as a zealous film blogger, essentially because new essays feel like necessary exercises to keep up with the ever-changing approach we bring to it. What I see in it now, long after it first caught my eye, in no way resembles the austere – if inconclusive – opus I assumed it to be all those years ago, and like a fine wine each taste grows slightly more intense and savory, until at last we last we become one with a sensation that sits above the literal content. Think of the film’s unsettling score as it underlines the action, then reflect on how its intensity seems less alien to ears that now can detect a menagerie of whispering voices, suspicious alarms and paranormal vibrations between the orchestra swells. We arrive there much in the same way Jack arrives at the center of the Overlook Party of 1921 – by a deep sense of wonder that no longer desires to stay trapped inside the box of space and time we all populate.<br /><br /><i>Written by DAVID KEYES</i><p></p>David Keyeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03067794906887523107noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2451838183910864405.post-56648187219827609092021-04-10T21:24:00.002-07:002021-04-10T21:24:19.756-07:00Willy's Wonderland / * (2021)<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjambPO3vOt2IEZhiko1F8B4qs0BQuz7ySANKXhMtjNeXPPFBzyWMO_ftPQ0BdCPxLbz-osNJ9h18Q1xMPKZ6-FiNyHdzRw5ZnrUZC0M4n85rfHTBi9BkdhNdBYuusxCDehEMUHROaM_Iuw/s2000/willy-s-wonderland-signature-entertainment-3-1610964628.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1333" data-original-width="2000" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjambPO3vOt2IEZhiko1F8B4qs0BQuz7ySANKXhMtjNeXPPFBzyWMO_ftPQ0BdCPxLbz-osNJ9h18Q1xMPKZ6-FiNyHdzRw5ZnrUZC0M4n85rfHTBi9BkdhNdBYuusxCDehEMUHROaM_Iuw/w400-h266/willy-s-wonderland-signature-entertainment-3-1610964628.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>Consider the fascinating dichotomy of this idea. A series of mysterious fatal accidents have closed the doors of a small-town children’s restaurant featuring those clunky animatronic characters that you usually see in Chuck E. Cheese establishments, and years later the residents of said town still harbor enough resentment against the building that they take to vandalizing the property, sometimes even trying to set fire to it. Within those walls, they say, are the remains of a terrible legacy. Then one day, when a mysterious hot-rod enthusiast crashes his car on a road just outside the city, his lack of money leads to a dubious offer: if he will clean up the interiors of the abandoned facility while locked inside for one whole night, his car will be fixed and ready to drive off by morning. Of course, that means his agreement will lead to the discovery of negative energies permeating throughout the dark halls and musty dining rooms, once the setting of events that imply the creepy-looking animatronics are far more than just stuffing and wires. In some circles this is the same sort of irony that led to our festering fear of clowns, also once seen as an innocent facet of childhood entertainment. And perhaps there is a lot of fun to be had with that setup, especially for those who indulge in the irreverent possibilities of the material. But the new film “Willy’s Wonderland” is an even stranger offense: a vehicle that takes those risks and robs them of all possible tension and enthusiasm. For 89 minutes, we watch on helplessly as eager people show up in front of a camera and slog their way through material that could not be any more listless if it had been written by zombies.<span><a name='more'></a></span><br /><br />The central problem, I suspect, involves how the writing deals with its lead character. Known only as the “Janitor,” here is a man who walks into his situation and regards it with not so much as a hint of shock or awe. There is a moment during his first violent confrontation – involving a mechanical ostrich – that establishes a dubious tone: he stares blankly at his nemesis, squints one eye, then awkwardly pushes out his lips as he is assaulted and nearly upended by the mechanical villain. Unfortunately for the robotic beast, however, the Janitor is not a soft pushover; after one or two quick-witted maneuvers, he is standing over the supernatural entity, beating it into submission, before scooping up the remains in a plastic bag and then resuming his task of cleaning the restaurant’s vacant interiors. Is there something the movie is holding back from us about its hero? Does he know more than he lets on? If not, then how does an ordinary wanderer simply step out of a tangible reality and into the lurid fantasy of this one without so much as an inflection of bemusement? The greater offense: he never seems vulnerable to the attacks of his eventual adversaries, always outwitting and besting them before they can get a good shot in on him (his minor wounds are bandaged by duct tape, I guess, for a sort of hilarity effect). That makes him less a personality and more a plot device, and a fatal one at that; because he can never seem to step out of his pattern of destroying the animatronics in very rapid succession, the movie never allows simple tension or horror to build up into something substantial.<p></p><p>The Janitor is played here by Nicolas Cage, a man of so many faces and distinctions that his charisma, at this stage, seems to hinge on his ability to keep a straight face. Fortunately for him, “Willy’s Wonderland” offers him not a single line of dialogue, instead choosing to make his character mute, I guess, to avoid having him explain where he is from or how he got there (not that any explanation would make much difference). That means all the film’s explanatory dialogue is left in the hands of the inexperienced, and boy do they have their work cut out for them. Consider poor and hopeless Liv (Emily Tosta), a rebellious teenage girl who knows the secrets of the restaurant and is seen early on engaging in potential arson… just before she is whisked away by her guardian (Beth Grant), also the town’s stone-faced Sherriff. Left handcuffed to a pipe as punishment, her teenage friends break her out of her predicament and venture back to Willy’s Wonderland, where they make another attempt to burn down the building just as they endeavor to free the Janitor from his predicament. How do they know he is there? Liv eventually offers up a backstory that can be seen coming from a mile away: the town’s law enforcement routinely offers frequent sacrifices to the animatronics as a way of soothing their temperaments, and the Cage character is only the latest in a long line of acquisitions. The reason? She explains the entirety of the origin in a flashback that involves child murders and satanic sacrifices, culminating with the sprits of said homicidal maniacs taking possession of the animatronics like bloodthirsty poltergeists.</p><p>All of this might have been amusing if it were not so shoddy. The director, Kevin Lewis, is ill-equipped to handle the material with any sincerity, and many of his stylistic choices appear to be sourced by an inability to competently realize effective technical language. His camera is often so clueless with nuance and staging that there are moments when we see the animatronics move independently without any musical or lighting cue, as if to suggest the actions are accidental in scenes that might have been able to use them as foreshadowing. Later still, during the sequences that involve the Janitor doing away with the mechanical monsters, the photography blots out the clarity of the details by blurring them behind shaky camerawork and muted color palettes. If this is, indeed, all part of the modern style that goes with these hyper-hipster genre pieces as some reviewers have suggested, I am dumbfounded how this can be seen as acceptable to an audience that ought to be provided much more detail.</p><p>Likewise, the screenplay by G.O. Parsons makes another fatal mistake: it supplies the movie’s villainous entities with their own running dialogue, framed less like ominous warnings and more like terrible one-liners right out of the Freddy Krueger manual of bad horror movie puns. What is the pitch here? The desired result? Are we supposed to be amused by the notion of these supposedly terrible entities having the good humor to row with their intended victims just before the blood starts spurting everywhere? There is no consistency in tone or distinction here. That leads to a climax that is equally mismanaged: after disposing of six of the seven animatronics singlehandedly, the Janitor finally reaches confrontation with Willy himself, the robot containing the soul of the restaurant’s former owner/homicidal maniac. He does not go down without a fight, of course, furiously swiping at Cage so that his shirt is torn to pieces and he is eventually flung into the ball pit, where he remains unmoving for one long minute.</p><p>Then, in the tradition of all the scenes that have come before it, the Janitor emerges with minimal injury long enough to tear the final animatronic to shreds, eventually emerging in the daylight to the stunned faces of townsfolk who were convinced he would never have survived. Their awe, unfortunately, is only matched by my very impatience with how this all is staged. The movie is a thievery of all it suggests. A horror movie without horror. A slick thriller that has no thrills, no sharpness or with, and no inkling to even generate the bare minimum of plausible suspicion. Even the animatronics themselves are more awkward than menacing, looking like overgrown stuffed animals that one might see lingering on the cheap table at a local yard sale. They, perhaps, are the most fortunate of the film’s victims: no effort was obviously wasted on them in the first place. Instead, all the time and energy was put into concocting a visual that repels rather than intrigues. We ought to have been engrossed by a premise this irreverent, this self-aware. All that these filmmakers manage to achieve in those final throes of foolishness is to inspire our loathing. I hated this movie more than almost any other film I have seen in the past year.<br /><br />Written by DAVID KEYES<br /><b style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;"><br />Horror/Action
(US); 2021; Not Rated; Running Time: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt; text-align: justify;">89 Minutes</span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><u>Cast:</u><br /></span></b></p><div style="text-align: left;"><b><b style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Nicolas Cage: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt; text-align: justify;">The Janitor<br /></span><b style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Emily Tosta: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt; text-align: justify;">Liv<br /></span><b style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Beth Grant: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt; text-align: justify;">Sheriff Lund<br /></span><b style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Ric Reitz: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt; text-align: justify;">Tex Macadoo<br /></span><b style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Chris Warner: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt; text-align: justify;">Jed Love<br /></span><b style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Kai Kadlec: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt; text-align: justify;">Chris<br /></span><b style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Caylee Cowan: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt; text-align: justify;">Kathy<br /></span><b style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;"><br />Produced by </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt; text-align: justify;">Tamara Birkemoe, Nicolas
Cage, Grant Cramer, Mark Damon, Jeremy Daniel Davis, Kevin V. Duncan, David
Fannon, Scottland Olds Harbert, Bryan Lord, David Nagelberg, Seth Needle, Michael
Nilon, David Ozer, Victor Perillo, Adam Rifkin, Tim Rouhana, Jake Seal and Lawreen
K. Yakkel</span><span style="font-size: 10pt; text-align: justify;">; <b>Directed by </b>Kevin Lewis;<b> Written by </b>G.O. Parsons</span></b></div><p></p>David Keyeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03067794906887523107noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2451838183910864405.post-67476102085522887892020-08-03T10:21:00.004-07:002020-08-03T10:30:55.197-07:00Host / *** (2020)<div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi5BysCeHgdkFskhPbzhxJ7vOjUyDmXrlqgiBNJ8D3Np-RmESSm8cI9n7iZgO59v_ij6pETKlL5wymYY9CV8g1WKjKfYUKC54-BMRootmKvcVEgyeousjTBkghLpGL-oMQY1nt3F4YcTnPb/s445/HOST-1.jpg" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="267" data-original-width="445" height="267" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi5BysCeHgdkFskhPbzhxJ7vOjUyDmXrlqgiBNJ8D3Np-RmESSm8cI9n7iZgO59v_ij6pETKlL5wymYY9CV8g1WKjKfYUKC54-BMRootmKvcVEgyeousjTBkghLpGL-oMQY1nt3F4YcTnPb/w445-h267/HOST-1.jpg" width="445" /></a></div>Any discussion we can have about “Host” ought to begin with the genius of its timing. Made on the cheap, conceptualized in isolation and filmed entirely on web cameras during the recent Covid-19 quarantine, director Rob Savage took an idea previously used in the “Unfriended” series and spun it on its head, using it to an advantage that reflected this strange and frightening time of social distancing. All its stars, situations and setups are executed in a way that involves no one ever being in the same room with one another, although their cellphones and computers are all functional when they are haunted by a malevolent spirit moving between them. How does it come to be, and how do the six key players of the movie summon it on an evening when their remote gathering progresses into a gradual, unrelenting nightmare? That is part of the fun in this well-made little “found footage” picture that shows remarkable skill and modulation given the urgency at which it was formulated and released. Now available as an exclusive on the Shudder streaming service, Savage has breathed refreshing new life into a sub-genre that has long been floundering for new inspirations.<span><a name='more'></a></span><br /><br />Think of what it means to say that in 2020, well after the film circles have begun dismissing “found footage” as the most tired gimmick of the horror canon. What an insight the notion presents. After so much attempt, so many isolated vehicles, in which little is accomplished other than repetition, along comes a singular impulse in which the momentum of the idea is propelled by its technique rather than enslaved by it. Most such endeavors, especially in the last few years, have the strange dichotomy of tonal overkill; among all the conventional tropes of hyperactive camera edits and improvised dialogue exchanges are ideas too elaborate to seem likely, especially as they are discovered in incidental routines. The backbone of “Host” wisely implicates all the relevant common bonds. There is no way this plot, this idea, would work in any other format. And if there is to be a silver lining surrounding this current health crisis as it continues to place perpetual barriers between people, concepts like these may, at long last, find a footing for new degrees of relevance.</div><div><br /></div><div>The idea of the premise is straightforward and deadpan. One night during the first phase of the lockdown, six friends have decided to jump into a Zoom meeting to partake in a virtual séance, headed by a clairvoyant named Seylan (Seylan Baxter). It is one of the choice activities recommended by Haley (Haley Bishop), who has undergone one recently and is fascinated by the possibilities of the spirit world. The others, on the other hand, are along more out of passive support for routine rather than plausible belief – including Jemma (Jemma Moore), who wisecracks and distracts with all the perfunctory behaviors of a movie skeptic. Unfortunately for them, one of the unspoken rules of conducting such a ritual, at least among serious spectators, is capturing the buy-in of all those who are involved; if one among them does not conduct themselves with integrity or honesty, they risk opening a door towards something darker on the other side. That means trouble is afoot when Jemma inadvertently attempts to create excitement in an otherwise dreary exchange by inventing a fake spirit to talk to, all while the others watch on faithfully. When she reveals it is all just an elaborate joke, the damage has been done; the spirits are angered by her deception and a vengeful force has found its way into their séance, where it will haunt, mystify, confuse and eventually enact violence on each of them as they remain huddled around their webcams.</div><div><br /></div><div>You surmise much of this via verbal exchanges throughout the brief 56-minute running time, when characters are talking over each other while their attention is split between the virtual meeting windows and routines still going on at home. No one stops to explain or clarify, a reflection of the displacement the movie wants to make from the people on screen and the notion that they are subjects of a horror film. When we first meet them, there is a sense their camaraderie is a long-standing ritual, and the meeting functions like the latest act in a long series of get-togethers marking the past. Lesser horror films might be too cognizant of viewers listening in, and their words would over-emphasize the framework. But Savage, who is a relative novice to this field, has studied the better examples of the genre and extracted the most apropos devices. It is not enough for the movie to feel like the embodiment of a single moment in time; those on the screen have to hold themselves as if it is all just happenstance, a reactionary measure of a behavior that is realized and accepted in their heads. This means they are also privy to private thoughts that suggest more going on in the periphery, especially during the more climactic exchanges. Observe, for instance, how Caroline (Caroline Ward) seems to whisper consoling remarks to herself when she goes to investigate a strange noise in the attic, taking along her laptop so that all can witness what she might find. Does it matter, really, that the audience cannot entirely make out the train of thought? Of course not. These are details that add a sense of dynamic to an otherwise conventional exercise of horror tropes.</div><div><br /></div><div>The movie’s suspenseful push does not disappoint. In a final act that is wall-to-wall with supernatural encounters, we watch on excitedly as cameras go dead, internet feeds briefly flicker and obscure nearby shadows, images manifest and others go missing as the certainty of the predicament becomes obvious. A chair one of the victims is sitting on flings itself backward. Doors swing open. Strange noises lead to the discovery of other horrors – missing loved ones, sudden loss of electricity, and bloody ambushes. When the fiancée of Radina (Radina Drandova) goes missing, her frantic search through cellphone records overlaps a terror brewing in another camera lens: Caroline’s video feed changes to a loop of old footage and is then interrupted by the sight of the girl’s head being smashed against the laptop screen. And if you think that Radina’s own problems are dropped, think again: after the others realize that Caroline might have been killed, the body of her missing boyfriend falls at her feat after apparently being held up by an invisible force near the ceiling.</div><div><br /></div><div>If you are to blink or sway your attention for any duration in the last 15 minutes of the film, you are likely to miss something critical. The final act is wall-to-wall with complexity. It never lets up on reveals or jump scares. How did Savage stage all this so effectively, and from a safe social distance? The wonder of the execution becomes almost as fascinating as the nature of the vengeful spirit terrorizing his victims. Likewise, the girls on screen – also new to this field – are competent vessels for the horror he inflicts. They react as if their impulses are dictated by an uncertainty that rises from the atmosphere of the cultural times. Are they right to be dismissive at first, especially given everything going on around them in the world? Can we blame them for laughing nervously when the mad sweep of Covid-19 has robbed everyone of their most dependable security? Here is a smart little scarefest that does more than manage an enjoyable ride into hell: it argues the destination is destined to get worse if we continue to ignore the most obvious warning signs.</div><div><br /></div><div>Written by DAVID KEYES</div><div><br /></div><div><div>Horror (UK); 2020; Not Rated; Running Time: 56 Minutes</div><div><br /></div><div>Cast:</div><div>Haley Bishop: Haley</div><div>Jemma Moore: Jemma</div><div>Emma Louise Webb: Emma</div><div>Radina Drandova: Radina</div><div>Caroline Ward: Caroline</div><div>Seylan Baxter: Seylan</div><div><br /></div><div>Produced by Douglas Cox, Craig Engler, Emily Gotto, Rob Savage, Jed Shepherd and Samuel Zimmerman; Directed by Rob Savage; Written by Gemma Hurley, Rob Savage and Jed Shepherd</div></div>David Keyeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03067794906887523107noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2451838183910864405.post-10400998343753361452020-07-31T09:50:00.000-07:002020-07-31T09:50:01.558-07:00Savage Streets / *** (1984)<div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgoOz90Ifk42_3lRYxDYj17-Mdp3x3sRC-o7Ljc43acfhYIP5ga3XdgO1h2wMMQkK66lATEJDsLggqu9UrqndxqsyM314Yxa-XrGRxunCWAPdbVKgNUlFQ0kibmMic4U0b9edXMiO0D8gEp/s1000/savage2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="660" data-original-width="1000" height="270" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgoOz90Ifk42_3lRYxDYj17-Mdp3x3sRC-o7Ljc43acfhYIP5ga3XdgO1h2wMMQkK66lATEJDsLggqu9UrqndxqsyM314Yxa-XrGRxunCWAPdbVKgNUlFQ0kibmMic4U0b9edXMiO0D8gEp/w410-h270/savage2.jpg" width="410" /></a></div>Good comedies are a dime a dozen. Mediocre ones ride a crowded wave occupied by the most consistent of underachievers: the same school of filmmakers that persist in the tired trend of momentary gross-outs, sight gags and juvenile humor associated with the human digestive system. Unintentional ones, on the other hand, are another commodity – they come from that place of mistaken values that is sometimes so vacuous of common sense, we are left with no other solution than to howl in protest. Consider “Savage Streets” as an example of this latter classification, and you begin to see beyond what can otherwise be surmised as a god-awful “Death Wish” rip-off. Not a single scene of the movie is modulated as if it were in sincerity. Characters speak to each other in vulgar soundbites that are detached from rhythms of the moment, seeming as if they are merely hurling graphic vulgarities at dead space for effect. And then there is a notable sequence in which two teenage competitors – one played by Linda Blair – engage in fisticuffs in the middle of the girl’s locker room while their naked classmates bounce up and down in enthusiasm. In any ordinary movie, these would be prime examples of sheer tonal absence. But then you take them into the context of a full running time that is chock-full of after-school-special melodrama, hammy acting, hackneyed back stories, implausible scenarios, overzealous cruelty, laughable sentiment and trashy and implausible violence, and you begin to suspect those involved have set out to make the most hilariously bad movie of its time.<span><a name='more'></a></span><br /><br />The year is 1984, when made-for-television movies are ebbing at a high popularity and theatrical offenses like “I Spit on Your Grave” and “The Lonely Lady” are casting doubts on the value systems of male directors intoxicated by thematic misogyny. The air of Hollywood’s back alleys is thick in exploitation, where once-reputable faces – like Blair – and yet-to-be-discovered new talents – such as Linnea Quigley – seek any sort of steady work that is feasible. Along comes a script that must have been stitched together out of leftover chunks of the more mainstream “revenge” pictures of the time, about a group of high school girls who discover the looming shadow of four male delinquents hovering over their hyperactive nightlife. All a girl wants to do, they say, is have fun. But rape and violence are never far from the minds of Jake (Robert Dryer) and his three perverted teenage henchmen, who ride around at night in their car to accost buxom females on the street before returning to their hideout in a textile warehouse to dish on their conquests. The object of their primary affections: Brenda (Blair), a streetwise high school senior whose entourage of pretty, smart-mouthed peers hover around her like a shield from their vulgar come-ons. Among them, unfortunately, is shy and sweet Heather (Quigley), Brenda’s deaf sister, who is blissfully unaware of the danger that follows: when she is left alone in a gymnasium the day after the girls trash Jake’s car, they abduct her, rape her in a bathroom, and leave her for dead. And so the seeds are planted for a pseudo-psychological sex war as the girls attempt to find the culprits, the men attempt to hide their misdeeds as one feels remorse, and poor Heather is left isolated in Intensive Care for the remainder of the picture, just so that she can recover in time for one climactic shot after vengeance has come and gone.</div><div><br /></div><div>Did I give too much away? That would only go without saying for someone who has never been privy to a story of this creed. The primary shtick of vigilante justice yarns is not whether karma will be visited on the people who are responsible for the crimes, per se, but how ambitious their ends will come. Do the sinners of wanton sex crimes endure fates that are equal to or graver than what they exacted on their victims? Do they atone for their mistakes before fate comes for them, or do they go out screaming in protest? The whole air of this idea is rooted in medieval ideology. The more austere offenses, like the notorious “I Spit on Your Grave,” usually end in pain and suffering that is almost wince-worthy. Unfortunately for the characters in “Savage Streets,” they are only teenagers; that means their sense of “eye for an eye” theatrics is limited to awkward, long-winded methods that would feel more at home in a Bugs Bunny cartoon. To look at Blair, who is destined to enact this revenge in a series of scenes towards the end, you would assume something vicious. She is dressed head-to-toe in tight black, with a headband around her hair, leers suspiciously with eyes that glint in resentment at the camera, and taunts her would-be victims with groan-worthy puns (“I wish you were double-jointed, so you could bend back and kiss your ass goodbye”). Wouldn’t you expect a woman that angry, that street-savvy, to be using a switchblade or a gun to punish those who raped her sister? Of course not – the movie instead turns her into an archery expert, allowing her to shoot a crossbow through dark corridors with accuracy that would have made Robin Hood envious.</div><div><br /></div><div>There is so much that gives the movie its nonsensical edge. Consider a subplot involving Francine (Lisa Freeman), one of Brenda’s closest friends, who has announced early on that she is pregnant with her boyfriend’s child. Teenagers, generally, are a mix of conflicting emotions when their body is ready to reproduce. So is not the case for young and hopeful Francine, though, who is overjoyed by the news; when she shares it with her beau, they plot to get married before buying a farm out in the country (yeah, right), and soon she off shopping for a wedding dress with her friends, oblivious to the difficulties that will follow her being a teenage mom. Unfortunately for her, the night before the big event, a run-in at the local club with Jake and his gang causes her to leave a scar on his face, which becomes the final trigger for his own volcanic temper. They chase her in the streets, corner her on a bridge and toss her over the side, all while she is still clutching the box that holds her bridal gown. Don’t you think at least one of the cars driving on said bridge might have stopped to intervene or at least inform the authorities?</div><div><br /></div><div>Other precious morsels. After Brenda’s physical run-in with a cheerleader rival, the two are summoned to the Principal’s office and accosted by him in a diatribe that trails off into… a deliberate come-on? Later, the two exchange more words in a classroom, before the other girl jumps up and shamelessly refers to her sister as a “retard.” Notice how in scenes like these that no one ever stares straight on at one another while they are exchanging such platitudes; it’s as if they are so embarrassed by the material that they have to look away to prevent from breaking into hysterics. That may be less difficult for Blair, of course, given her track record in the years after “The Exorcist.” Here is a woman who managed to make “Hell Night,” “Exorcist II: The Heretic,” “Chained Heat,” “Roller Boogie,” “Airport 75” and “Night Patrol” in a short ten years leading to this film. Perhaps she developed confidence in being center stage of so much schlock. What she accomplishes in “Savage Streets” that no one else could have is exemplary: she does not dwindle or slacken from the heavy-handed details, and her zeal is almost infectiously campy at moments where she is forcing confrontations with her soon-to-be victims. Say what you will about over-the-top enthusiasm in movies like these, here is a woman who is comfortable chewing the scenery until she is licking her lips in satisfaction.</div><div><br /></div><div>A great many of those films I listed, of course, are not nearly as amusing to sift through. The “Exorcist” sequel remains a boring and listless excursion into supernatural nonsense. “Night Patrol” is a comedy in which laughs only come when someone in the room yells obscenities back at the screen. “Roller Boogie” has the dubious distinction of making roller skate culture look like a slog through mediocrity. And “Chained Heat,” one of the most insufferable films I have ever seen, is best left remembered without involving it in active discussions. Yet here we are, talking about “Savage Streets” as if it were some bright spot in the whirlpool that was her late career. Perhaps that is because it has such aimless ambition. Maybe the idea of its grotesque revenge is sanitized into such harmless claptrap that it is harmless rather than offensive. Or maybe it is because the stars play up the absurdity until it transcends the awfulness of the pitch. We never turn away long from what they have to offer. Little of it is sincere or effective. And the male characters are the embodiment of every cliched nuance that comes with movie misogynism. But in the moment when they are penetrated by Blair’s arrows and her eyes widen in almost euphoric pleasure, we cannot help but find delight in the movie’s ability to raise ordinary behaviors into audacious, gleeful showmanship.</div><div><br /></div><div>Written by DAVID KEYES</div><div><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><b><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Drama/Thriller
(US); 1984; Rated R; Running Time: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">93 Minutes<br /></span></p><div style="text-align: justify;"><b style="text-align: left;"><u><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;"><br />Cast:<br /></span></u></b><b style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Linda Blair: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt; text-align: left;">Brenda<br /></span><b style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Robert Dryer: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt; text-align: left;">Jake<br /></span><b style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Sal Landi: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt; text-align: left;">Fargo<br /></span><b style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Scott Mayer: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt; text-align: left;">Red<br /></span><b style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Johnny Venokur: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt; text-align: left;">Vince<br /></span><b style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Linnea Quigley: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt; text-align: left;">Heather<br /></span><b style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Lisa Freeman: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt; text-align: left;">Francine</span></div><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Produced by </span></span></b><span style="font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">John L. Chambliss, Michael
Franzese, George Kryssing, Cleve Landsberg, Heidi Schulte, Jay Schultz and John
Strong</span><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">; <b>Directed by </b><span style="mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Danny Steinmann and Tom DeSimone;<b> Written by
</b>Norman Yonemoto, Danny Steinmann and John Strong</span></span></p></div>David Keyeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03067794906887523107noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2451838183910864405.post-88565936071656617482020-06-29T10:01:00.001-07:002020-06-29T10:01:29.921-07:00Eaten Alive / *** (1976)<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi0zTEQ1Gc9ktdGiYkhv8sG30hzGrWNmwRFUhpZRr4uDsJOVwzo_5IhHh3n1n3ZpfaV-ijUSc3FnrfkJvvl86nhB2zzsaWpit48jtGjME_2pnly5OcCdlqeJta93Kp7iv4cD1JtwgxkYKiN/s1600/eatenalive.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="352" data-original-width="600" height="233" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi0zTEQ1Gc9ktdGiYkhv8sG30hzGrWNmwRFUhpZRr4uDsJOVwzo_5IhHh3n1n3ZpfaV-ijUSc3FnrfkJvvl86nhB2zzsaWpit48jtGjME_2pnly5OcCdlqeJta93Kp7iv4cD1JtwgxkYKiN/s400/eatenalive.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
Much of what occurs on-screen in “Eaten Alive” is rooted in the sort of exploitative chutzpah of 70s horror films that frequently inspired those first audiences to recoil in utter disgust. Already familiar with those dubious qualities from his “The Texas Chainsaw Massacre,” of course, director Tobe Hooper committed to a similar premise that might as well have been transcribed from the diary of those original maniacs: a motel manager with crippling nervous ticks routinely invites strangers into his run-down establishment, terrorizes them and then murders them in cold blood before throwing their bodies – sometimes while still breathing – over the edge of his porch for a nearby crocodile to feast on. Occasionally, those victims will include relatives of prior victims, who go in search of their lost loved ones by retracing their steps right back to the spot of their demise. Yet somehow they resist all initial urges to question the shady nature of the establishment: stained wallpaper, rickety stairs and unstable floor boards all seem to suggest that a place like this would have been long condemned by the health board, much less been allowed to run a continuous operation. How do they allow themselves to dismiss skepticism long enough to accept lodgings? Why do they feel comfortable leaving behind their own belongings while they venture back into the city searching for clues? These are the impulses of men and women who have never even heard of a horror film, much less ever been in a situation where they are asked to exchange platitudes with eccentric recluses who smell of violence and shame.<br />
<a name='more'></a><br />Yet on and on they pile up, like flying insects who thoughtlessly wander too close to an electric bug zapper. None of them die or struggle valiantly, either. They scream, plead, gaze on in disbelief, and sometimes even concede themselves as the blade of an oversize scythe makes impact with their delicate flesh. All the time, their killer looks on as if he is watching a floor show at Chuck E. Cheeses, exhibiting a gleeful stupor that allows him to be almost hilariously animated. Not a thought has gone into skill or modulation, of course, because all that violates the trajectory of the genre picture in the aftermath of “Chainsaw”; for a while, it was almost mandatory for the victims to submit to their fates without much struggle, lest that complicate matters and rouse the audience into thinking about alternative ways out. Yet to describe “Eaten Alive” in all its gory and simplified excess no longer does the experience justice. In this age when the bloody offenses of horror films have ceased following boundaries, all these descriptors are redundant. No, a film like this endures as entertainment because all the performances are pitched at that joyous trajectory of cartoonish excess.<br />
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You know the kind. Think of the likes of Sam Raimi’s “Evil Dead” or Scott Spiegel’s “Intruder,” which contain a delightful self-awareness that pigeonholed the grotesque visuals into a more lighthearted context, especially when the characters expressed their hysteria in almost comical ways. Perhaps some trace of that can be seen here, in a film that is probably more perceptive about itself than the more of the mainstream examples. It is rooted in glee, not in contempt. The giveaway comes early on during the first on-screen kill: an insecure call girl (Crystin Sinclaire) is exiled from a whorehouse and sent to fend for herself in the nearby foggy swamps, where she stumbles upon a building operated by Judd (Neville Brand), a so-called motel manager. He invites her to stay, proceeds to carry her bags upstairs, then completely turns the tables on her – there is an ambitious ambush that ends with her body being filleted by the spokes at the end of a garden rake. His entire demeanor is a compulsion of madness too strategic to be accepted as plausible. The laughs speak for themselves. While it is possible that those early moviegoers might have been inspired to loathing or fright by the display, of course, our more evolved psyches are able to look past ordinary blood splatters and see, perhaps for the first time, a nerve that is knee-deep in campy showmanship.<br />
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This trajectory continues even as the film seems like it might be turning towards more cruel methods. Soon after, a small family containing a young girl and her dog become lost in the wilderness and pull up to the motel during dusk, where the set’s lighting ascends to a harsh reddish hue. As they check in, the dog wanders too close to the nearby marsh and is eaten by the crocodile, inspiring a stay in an upstairs bedroom in which the mother must console her young child while her husband awkwardly mocks the situation by barking at them (is he cruel, or insane?). He is the next of Judd’s destined victims; the wife, meanwhile, will become a captive, and the young daughter attempts to flee before becoming trapped under the ground level of the building, where she spends the rest of the movie screaming hysterically as the man – or the crocodile – attempt to corner her and do away with her. Yes, this series of scenes belongs to that ever-so-deplorable trope about putting defenseless kids in harm’s way, but there is an air of gleeful hysteria that fills their emotions. A better question to ask ourselves: why take matter seriously and with scorn if everyone on screen is playing the material like illogical farce?<br />
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At the time of its release, alas, the scope of the material was put under far less intrusive lights. In the aftermath of “Last House on the Left” and “Texas Chainsaw,” horror films were regarded as literal beasts – frontal attacks on the senses with little in the way of alternative contexts or ulterior motives. That meant many of the more daring pictures of that phase were viewed more crudely than they are now, when irony and deception are the seeds in which modern horror auteurs plant their macabre gardens. Craven’s own “Last House” has decidedly experienced the most notable shift of consensus in this aftermath. So, too, do the likes of “When a Stranger Calls” and “The Burning” acquire eventual accolades as their ideas are taken into the consideration of younger and more open minds. On the other hand, does anyone who watches “I Spit on Your Grave Now” find any meaningful social framework buried beneath the depravity? Are they all that enthusiastic to discuss “The Hitcher,” still infamous for that sequence in which a woman’s body is torn in half by two vehicles moving in opposite directions?<br />
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“Eaten Alive” earns the former benefit. It is impossibly bad, sure, but its offenses are foraged out of the vivacity of eager filmmakers rather than the intentions of more mean-spirited provocateurs. The performances, furthermore, are an infectious blend of over-the-top enthusiasm and joy, while the more literal effects – namely, the overgrown crocodile – are comical in how they manage to achieve so little with so much effort. Coming off his own career-defining genre hit, Hooper’s approach is an admirable, if silly, departure. I have never exactly been the greatest fan of “The Texas Chainsaw Massacre,” which cheats on the concept of terror by subjecting its victims to an instrument of swift overkill. Judd’s method, while no less sadistic or crazy, is roused by something more endearing: the notion that every time he opens his mouth, the confused diatribes are destined to inspire a collective howl.<br />
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Written by DAVID KEYES</div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Horror
(US); 1976; Rated R; Running Time: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">91 Minutes</span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><u><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Cast:<o:p></o:p></span></u></b></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Neville Brand: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Judd</span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Mel Ferrer: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Harvey Wood</span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Crystin Sinclaire: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Libby Wood</span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Marilyn Burns: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Faye</span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">William Finley: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Roy</span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Roberta Collins: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Clara</span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Stuart Whitman: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Sheriff Martin</span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Robert Englund: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Buck</span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Carolyn Jones: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Miss Hattie</span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<span style="mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Produced by </span></span></b><span style="font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Alvin L. Fast, Larry Huly,
Robert Kantor, Mardi Rustam, Mohammed Rustam and Samir Rustam</span><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">; <b>Directed by </b><span style="mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Tobe Hooper;<b> Written by </b>Alvin L. Fast and Mardi Rustam, based on
an adaptation by Kim Henkel</span></span></div>
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David Keyeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03067794906887523107noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2451838183910864405.post-13736004917727810032020-05-31T10:25:00.002-07:002020-05-31T10:25:26.897-07:00The Wraith / **1/2 (1986)<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj6XyLzn4GTrd1ToPFXMSS-LflEd0EnEhyAf4asfE-6DwzVrCdNLfsk2IckoKuSYsVMZgNU8c7fLGHQfMIb_L4ljiUsesDzSCsCbbhiPgge-bgKqK8LxVR6DaFUJ3FQ2MPIi3uiHSAjalM5/s1600/The-Wraith-movie-review.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj6XyLzn4GTrd1ToPFXMSS-LflEd0EnEhyAf4asfE-6DwzVrCdNLfsk2IckoKuSYsVMZgNU8c7fLGHQfMIb_L4ljiUsesDzSCsCbbhiPgge-bgKqK8LxVR6DaFUJ3FQ2MPIi3uiHSAjalM5/s400/The-Wraith-movie-review.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
In the annals of absurd action films that dominated the public’s awareness during the 80s, “The Wraith” may hold special distinction as the silliest of them all. How else would one describe the very idea of this film? Could it be done with a straight face, or some semblance of seriousness? Here is a premise that seems as if it were pulled right out of farce: a gang of car thieves murder a man, and then said victim is reincarnated from above so that he can exact his revenge by, well, racing them all to their deaths inside a mysterious black car. But wait, it gets better: when he is not inside said vehicle, he appears as an enigmatic drifter played by Charlie Sheen, who comes into town and interacts will all the same people who were once part of his previous life, including those who killed him. How do they not recognize him? Because, rather conveniently, his face has been changed. Furthermore, none of those observers suspect who he really is, although chance encounters eventually create enough of a sense of déjà vu to inspire all the obligatory inquiries (“have we met before?”). If you’re still paying attention, congratulate yourself: you may have actually thought more thoroughly about this setup than Mike Marvin, whose screenplay might as well have been assembled out of remnants of shorthand notes from an etch-a-sketch.<br />
<a name='more'></a><br />The opening scene, set against a gloomy night sky, is like an overture of cartoonish absurdity. As the music pulsates at a low throb, white lights are seen descending from the heavens and onto the desert road, where they zoom past the camera lens until they morph into the shell of the elusive Dodge M4S, which will become the object of affection for all the movie’s car-hungry antagonists. Behind the wheel, of course, is Jake Kesey (Sheen), sent back from the heavens to play the “Wraith,” a road vigilante that must exact vengeance on all those cutthroat hot rod crooks who murdered him after he was found making love to Kari (Sherilyn Fenn), the would-be girlfriend of the local car gang’s jealous leader Packard (Nick Cassavetes). Still following along? Good. The gimmick is that when Jake is away from his car, he must appear as a new town local, passing quiet time at a watering hole and engaging with his peers at a roadside burger shack, where all the key players seem to either gather or work. None of them, of course, know his identity, both from his previous life and from his mysterious alter ego. This becomes a frame of reference for audiences who may suspect added dramatic tension later in the film, when it is entirely possible that Packard or the misfits in his entourage might stumble upon the truth of the man during one of many deadly encounters with his elusive car.<br />
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Their villainous pattern is not exactly intricate. Early on, a young couple go joyriding at night through the desert with their music blaring, where the gang corners them hold the girl passenger hostage and force her boyfriend, the driver, to bet the pink slip of his car in a single race. Inevitably, the gang has managed to outfit their own vehicles with all the right parts to guarantee their victories on the road, which makes them infallible to all the supporting players: they look on in spite and resentment but never come right out to challenge them. This may explain why poor Keri, the primary victim of Packard’s lustful abuse, is so adept at putting up with his cruelty. She sees no other alternative, especially with a man who simply refuses to hear any denial of his advances. Given the mysterious death of her last romantic interest, it would also be unwise of her to return the flirtatious advances of newcomer Jake, who seems to have no fear of Packard or his verbal threats. Her response is at odds with her feelings: is he wise to ignore the danger, or does he know something more than he lets on?<br />
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The gang members, many of them dimwitted, go down one-by-one in chases that seem more like supernatural traps than feasible contests. The setup is exactly the same in each: one of the gang members challenges the quiet figure, who gets into his car, keeps pace with the competitor and then is left behind when he disappears entirely, in a mad burst of speed that makes the DeLorean of “Back to the Future” seem sluggish. Seeing the need to catch the Wraith, the driver speeds up more and then runs right into the side of the Dodge, which has positioned itself as a roadblock and causes the other car to explode on impact. A strange phenomenon: when each of the victims is pulled from the burning wreckage, none of them have endured any burns to their body. Is this strategic to some broader implication the movie will eventually make, or just an elaborate gimmick to suggest the presence of otherworldly interference? The movie never really clarifies. All the same, it is enough to rouse the suspicious demeanor of Sherriff Loomis (Randy Quaid), who has sought an opportunity to dismantle the local car gang but now finds himself being outdone by the vengeful road warrior with an axe to grind.<br />
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No other person is more infuriated by that notion than Nick Cassavetes, son to the late (and great) John, who plays the movie’s villain. Setting his sights on the dubious achievement of delivering menacing gazes atop overzealous (and cheesy) dialogue, he becomes almost delightfully campy in his portrayal. That may explain the magnetism of both the audience and of his victims, particularly poor Keri, who is good at keeping his advances at a distance while being unable to entirely tear herself away from his leering grasp. Some part of us collectively knows he is destined for failure – an ambitious and hopefully dramatic one. Cassavetes does not disappoint, often moving through the scenes with ostentatious flair and ridiculous masochism. Consider a scene where he attempts to “prove” his love to Keri by, well, cutting his hand open while she is in the car and then licking the blood from the wound. Is there any character in serious art outside of Shakespeare that would do this in a movie and not expect to arouse howls of laughter?<br />
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The movie is the full sum of a plethora of ridiculous pieces. The actors, who probably have shown up for something more serious than what was possible, do their best to sell the material with misplaced sincerity. The character relationships develop only as far as they must, to serve the purpose of the exploits of the mysteries of the third act. The chase scenes are nothing special but develop a kind of charm for their dependability as devices for the plot’s movement. And though the revenge angle goes unexplained, we could just imagine what Marvin could have accomplished had he taken the time to dream up a full scenario for this premise: I see a prologue in which the murdered man bargains hilariously with otherworldly forces for the chance to return to Earth and seek his payback. Would that not have taken the momentum of the movie above its otherwise straightforward, however preposterous, trajectory? As it stands, “The Wraith” is simply enjoyable as an exercise in the futile nature of the idea. It does not achieve the same absurdist grandeur of, say, “Sky Bandits” or “Mannequin,” which are essentially live action cartoons. But it means well. And given what we know now of a film industry that loves to attach large budgets to vehicles that function on the same intellectual level, that will be more than enough for those in the mood for disposable nostalgia.<br />
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Written by DAVID KEYES</div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Action/Thriller
(US); 1986; Rated PG-13; Running Time: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">93 Minutes</span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><u><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Cast:<o:p></o:p></span></u></b></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Charlie Sheen: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Jake Kesey</span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Nick Cassavetes: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Packard Walsh</span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Sherilyn Fenn: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Keri Johnson</span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Randy Quaid: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Sheriff Loomis</span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Matthew Barry: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Billy Hankins</span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">David Sherrill: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Skank</span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Jamie Bozian: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Gutterboy</span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Clint Howard: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Rughead</span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;"><br />
<span style="mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Produced by </span></span></b><span style="font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Buck Houghton, John Kemeny
and Jeffrey Sudzin</span><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">; <b>Directed and
written by </b><span style="mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Mike Marvin</span></span></div>
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David Keyeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03067794906887523107noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2451838183910864405.post-16113858859183873882020-05-27T20:37:00.000-07:002020-05-27T20:37:07.920-07:00Unfriended: Dark Web / ***1/2 (2018)<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEglv_ITLA1ifaQZxSVvPa2MjqZyDLRuTvSSdx4Chi8V3XvIg7sJO2RMnErRb7ohTL3Kn92Nu1jUwVCp7jZmsCKwBCJ6wB5XAiNd7bB5bJybkGISoxezuKOe6mm8lnraK9WI9SxUZ1ERaikS/s1600/Unfriended-SCREAM.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="776" data-original-width="1368" height="226" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEglv_ITLA1ifaQZxSVvPa2MjqZyDLRuTvSSdx4Chi8V3XvIg7sJO2RMnErRb7ohTL3Kn92Nu1jUwVCp7jZmsCKwBCJ6wB5XAiNd7bB5bJybkGISoxezuKOe6mm8lnraK9WI9SxUZ1ERaikS/s400/Unfriended-SCREAM.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
No single idea in the found footage horror subgenre has been as inconclusive as that of the one first observed in “Unfriended.” Consider the concept: for 83 minutes, characters remain static in a world of pixelated webcam images and cluttered desktop screens while a malevolent force somewhere in their chat boxes taunts them. Gradually, they are ambushed by something outside the periphery of the Skype window, until a lone person is left to answer for crimes that all present may have once participated in. Is this an idea full of potential, or one where the gimmick is destined to fade from novelty after the initial experience has worn off? Our fascination was certainly enough to inspire a single sit-through of the first attempt, although that movie sees little in the way of ongoing value; once the ploy is understood, the antics play like a wind-up toy instead of a plausible tool to modulate tension, especially in repeat viewings. Yet here we are again for a sequel, titled “Dark Web,” which utilizes the exact same format and implores the spontaneous hysteria of the same sorts of young actors, who balance their running commentary with all the perfunctory inquiries – like, “what’s that noise?” or “please don’t hurt me!” The irony of most new approaches in horror is how thoroughly familiar all the tricks seem, even as they are repackaged to avoid more obvious giveaways.<br />
<a name='more'></a><br />This time, something about the affair works rather well. If “Unfriended” showed this idea in a state of awkward infancy, then “Unfriended: Dark Web” allows it to mature into a proverbial, meticulous beast, ripe with inspiration and unrelenting in the way it stacks one impossibility onto another with skill and enthusiasm. The plot is also more intricate: instead of dealing with a gathering of friends who are haunted by a deceased spirit lurking in cyberspace, this ensemble finds itself facing the very real horrors of a vengeful shadow from the very real “Dark Web,” who turns out to be the rightful owner of a stolen laptop in the party and wants it returned as its horrific hidden secrets become unearthed during a single evening of remote gameplay and dialogue. Of course, none of the others initially know the computer in question was swiped, having been told it was an acquisition from Craigslist. Their association, as is usually in the case in horror movies, becomes a fatal error that carries them along the ensuing current of chaos, and right into the skillful embrace of a filmmaker who plays the material like the pilot of a jet heading into a literal insanity.<br />
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The details are set into motion by Matias (Colin Woodell), a 20-something kid with boyish charm and good looks, who has come into the possession of a new laptop after it was seemingly abandoned at the coffee shop he works at. His audacious impulse is played off as an attempt to “upgrade” his hardware for his girlfriend, who is deaf and wants him to communicate better (his thinking: a newer computer will provide the software that will allow him to use sign language more effectively). Unfortunately, the machine in question is also rather tight on space, suggesting a hidden folder saved somewhere on the hard drive. When it is suggested by a friend in the party chat to look into the secret partition, he uncovers a series of videos that are ominous: some look as if they are surveillance of random homes, others revealing potential victims of kidnapping or torture. Then one of the girls, Amaya (Stephanie Nogueras), does her own research regarding the name on one of the files, and it turns out to be the same identity of a local girl who recently went missing. Is the man who owns these videos the same one who abducted her? Where is she now?<br />
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The “Dark Web” of the title is not an elusive concept. In the margins of cyberspace, lingering beyond the filters of trackable media and protected search parameters, a grotesque underbelly of human trafficking lurks with little interference, evading the awareness of seasoned authorities who would otherwise recoil in horror at what they partake in. A taste of this culture is revealed early on, after Matias shares a private chat between he and one of the laptop’s “employers,” who has just deposited a large sum of money into an Internet bank account in exchange for a dubious request: he must inflict terrible mutilation to a proposed female victim. This, we quickly realize, is the precursor to much more potential terror nearby, when the laptop’s original owner messages him with an ultimatum: if he does not turn the stolen device over without tipping off his chat buddies, his deaf girlfriend will be murdered on camera for him to witness. An added visual touch: the girlfriend’s apartment serves as one of the chat windows on his screen, where the villain is seen lurking silently behind her while he hopelessly pleads with her to notice. As pure visual, the moment is a visceral thud against our anxious hearts. But the movie also does not back away from it, either. It follows it up with successive tension, each moment more severe than the last, like some kind of elaborate macabre symphony where crescendos become an abundant staple.<br />
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You can sense the enthusiasm of the director, Stephen Susco, for nearly every moment of the wall-to-wall chaos he packs into 92 minutes of screen time. A newbie to filmmaking with only a handful of writing credits to his name (including the first “Grudge” picture), he exhibits a promising aptitude for the frenetic energy that comes with this method, right down to the shrewd way he balances the actions of characters atop evasive motives and half-revealed intentions. Consider a brilliant sequence, for instance, where Matias attempts to tell everyone in the chat about the murderous Dark Web maniac without him finding out, even though it is clear he is watching remotely. The lead deduces, wisely, that his view is being supplied by the girlfriend’s compromised cellphone, which she uses to indicate her movement towards his place aboard a subway terminal. How can he reveal the secret while still playing it casual? Simple: he waits for the online button on her chat window to go off as she passes into tunnels with no reception. Whether this works or is simply a fatal mistake is irrelevant, of course; it is the fact that it is happening at all, surrounded by so much uncertainty, that gives the scene its more visceral value. Here is yet another example of how universal the teachings of Alfred Hitchcock remain, even in the likes of more modern horror movies – to a smart audience, the real horror occurs by knowing a bomb only might go off underneath a nearby table.<br />
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The climax, meanwhile, is an even stranger phenomenon: it has that rare distinction of being almost entirely unpredictable, no matter how hard we may try to decipher all the elaborate clues and insinuations. That means, therefore, that “Unfriended: Dark Web” carries an elusive distinction that so few others do in this age of convention and formula. The movie carves out its own, novel destiny. Reportedly, three endings were filmed for various mediums. The one I saw, involving a final shot containing an ensemble of hooded figures, seemed as complete and fitting as any cut of the movie needed. Of course there will be frequent talk about the impossibility of this premise, and certainly Susco, who also wrote his script, was not thinking in terms of pure logic when he concocted some of these elaborate scenarios for the screen. But the movie plays them plausibly, with focus and integrity, so that we do not mind that we are dealing with something that is rather far-fetched. By the final minutes, we realize we have spent yet another 90 minutes doing little more than staring at someone’s computer screen, and somehow have remained engaged the entire time. This is where the idea transcends its absurdist novelty and becomes a plausible path to terror.<br />
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Written by DAVID KEYES</div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Horror
(US); 2018; Rated R; Running Time: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">92
Minutes<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><o:p></o:p></b></span></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><u><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Cast:<o:p></o:p></span></u></b></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Colin Woodell: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Matias<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Stephanie Nogueras: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Amaya<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Betty Gabriel: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Nari<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Rebecca Rittenhouse: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Serena<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Andrew Lees: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Damon<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Connor Del Rio:</span></b><span style="font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;"> AJ<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Savira Windyani: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Lexx<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;"><br />
<span style="mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Produced by </span></span></b><span style="font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Timur Bekmambetov, Jason
Blum, Pavel P. Bozhkov, Todd Breau, Phil Daw, Nelson Greaves, Couper Samuelson,
Adam Sidman and Ryan Turek</span><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">; <b>Directed
and written by </b><span style="mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Stephen Susco</span></span></div>
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David Keyeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03067794906887523107noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2451838183910864405.post-20417827145280218302020-04-21T14:38:00.002-07:002022-08-02T18:22:48.022-07:00The Miranda Murders: Lost Tapes of Leonard Lake and Charles Ng / * (2017)<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjMT_lHH4Xc95W4K22OdwrLJTrGZoznQ1iBF6PsCgoqcJCD4WrA8PcJbZgTDuMuaU6xZ-lN4XF5jDYV0lB053FWCQDMzM4bf97KSbt1IF1n6nkfGsugeyssf6Fma366H6hMaccZz0O2YHTL/s1600/REV-TheMirandaMurders-01A-1024x576.jpg" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="576" data-original-width="1024" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjMT_lHH4Xc95W4K22OdwrLJTrGZoznQ1iBF6PsCgoqcJCD4WrA8PcJbZgTDuMuaU6xZ-lN4XF5jDYV0lB053FWCQDMzM4bf97KSbt1IF1n6nkfGsugeyssf6Fma366H6hMaccZz0O2YHTL/s400/REV-TheMirandaMurders-01A-1024x576.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
A movie like this is almost unbearable without a coherent running dialogue. “The Miranda Murders” belongs primarily to that ever-so-volatile subgenre of found footage horror films, but must be prefaced with an even graver emphasis: all the footage functions as a reenactment of an actual killing spree that took place in California during the mid-80s. For those well-versed in serial killer psychology, the names will be familiar: Leonard Lake and Charles Ng were like blood brothers destined for infamy, linked by the nihilistic world view that innocent young women were meant to be abducted and then molded into submissive sex slaves for their own perverse pleasures, often in front of a camcorder. When they acted out or misbehaved, the punishment would be severe – sometimes violent, sometimes intimidating, always ending in their untimely demises. Now comes this strange concoction of a film that attempts to fill a great void: namely, what exactly transpired in those turbulent months between 1983 and 85 when they lured victims to their compound, filmed them in fearful protest and then disposed of their remains throughout the property? Though some of the actual footage of their exploits survives, the gaps were apparently intriguing enough to inspire Matthew Rosvally to interpret the unknown on old-fashioned analogue tape. The result is one of the most poorly realized ideas of recent memory.<br />
<a name='more'></a><br />Could a movie like this have worked on any level? Entertainment, surely, was not on anyone’s mind. That means the opportunity could be narrowed down to one of two plausible possibilities: present the footage as a straight document of those living horrors or intercut it with some sort of analysis. The latter, surely, would have been far sounder, and perhaps a great movie remains to be made about the Miranda Murders that utilizes this approach. Unfortunately, Rosvally opts to presents the material in such fragmented fashion that it completely detaches from its underlying motive. In the course of 73 minutes, we see the disturbed minds of Lake and Ng discuss their goals, overpower unsuspecting victims, taunt them to tears, bash their heads in with hammers, rape them, chase them, imprison them, bury their remains outdoors, and somehow find time to argue about each other’s own skill. How do you pack so much into a movie that otherwise feels like it was destined to be a short subject? The movie cuts away from action so often, so haphazardly, that we are never allowed to penetrate the surface of whatever psychology the filmmakers hope we will take away from it.<br />
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A study of the men involved provides intriguing clues. Both Rosvally and his production partner, G.R. Claveria, began as friends on an offshoot theater project in 2016 when they contemplated the idea of uniting for a feature film. Tapping into their mutual love for horror, they made a dubious realization: together, they both resembled the real culprits of the Miranda Murders, who thus far had never been covered as subjects of a major motion picture. Therein this dubious idea was born, helmed by the same buddies who would be destined to star as the primary villains. The means what you see on screen is, to its credit, impassioned. Neither man is pitching themselves halfheartedly, because their stake goes beyond the mere notion of what they must accomplish in front of the camera. There is a scene towards the middle where Ng places his camera to the side of a mattress and is seen coercing a woman into rape while she cries and pleads for mercy. The execution is convincing, as if each is channeling the full scope of the context. Their problem is that they never let us into it; just as the momentum is established, the scene cuts to another encounter, then another, until we lose track of who the captives are and whether the killers have made new acquisitions off screen, or are simply recycling others. Would it have really been as difficult, even for the sake of the fantasy, to just assume Rosvally and Claveria would leave the camera running long enough to take in the full dread of the experience instead of just the brief mechanics of it?<br />
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The rhythm is established early on, after a brief setup in which Lake conveys his disturbing manifesto while he sprawls out in a recliner. Accompanying him as a pseudo guinea pig is his wife Cricket (Jenna Keefner), who proves to be a suitable stand-in for an assortment of restraints being tested to use on prospective victims. Initially, she finds amusement in the idea; later, Ng eavesdrops as Lake berates her loudly for not being fully obedient, and in the next scene she is telling the camera that she intends to divorce him and move in with her mother. In a fully-realized film, a catalyst like that would be the key moment where the killers go beyond the point of salvaging their souls; here, it’s just a gesture to remove one obstacle from the footage in order to make room for another. There is a vicious cycle to the method of Lake’s misogynist worldview, but Ng appears to be in over his head like a boy seeking the approval of a pessimistic guardian. That means his tendency towards violence and punishment is far more unrestrained, and in a key moment during the footage Lake berates him over the notion that he always kills the women too early for them to be trained properly.<br />
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Does this reflect the reality of the murders? Was Ng the instigator of the more sinister misdeeds? Was Lake more of a sexual sadomasochist than a homicidal maniac? The movie seems to be asking questions it has no intention of resolving. So, too, does it cloud the issue of personal responsibility. Consider Lake’s wife, for example. She disappears as the killing commences, but appears again on screen, briefly, to have a sexual encounter with Ng, and later still to be implicated in one of the murders. Is the movie saying she was involved, or bears some blame for what happened to all those people? The argument could go either way; none of the editing is consistent enough to establish her awareness, much less her physical involvement. For all we know, Cricket could simply have been aloof to all the chaos going around her, only appearing responsible because she knew how to show up in the wrong places at the wrong times.<br />
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Some people might take delight in the open-endedness of that approach. I find it irresponsible. The movie is, above all else, a fictionalized record of events that otherwise were based on absolute truth, and with that distinction comes the task of anchoring what you convey. This might have been where off-camera dialogue or narration could have been necessary. Remove the idea of this being a gritty, horrific ordeal and turn it into a full-on dramatized documentary, where the issues could be discussed and given levity. To do any less is to risk creating a disservice to those who literally died to provide the premise. Claveria and Rosvally’s problem is that they do the minimum – they fill the images with all the gush and suggestion of the terror while robbing it of basic tonal certainty. Are they fascinated by the Miranda Murders as crime enthusiasts, students of the mystifying serial killer mythos, or simply as detached voyeurs? Here is a movie that suggests they were just looking for something to kill time on until a more inspired idea came to mind.<br />
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Written by DAVID KEYES</div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Horror
(US); 2017; Rated R; Running Time: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">73 Minutes</span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><u><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Cast:<o:p></o:p></span></u></b></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Matthew Rosvally: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Leonard Lake</span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;">G.R. Claveria: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Charles Ng</span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Jenna Keefner: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Cricket</span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Kelci C. Magel: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Kathleen Allen</span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<span style="mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Produced by </span></span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">G.R. Claveria</span><span style="font-size: 10pt;">; <b>Directed by </b><span style="mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Matthew Rosvally;<b> Written by </b>G.R. Claveria and Matthew Rosvally</span></span></div>
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David Keyeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03067794906887523107noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2451838183910864405.post-87303574617349165582020-04-14T10:15:00.001-07:002022-01-04T16:49:35.579-08:00Hatchet / *** (2006)<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiSBr7Pp8XpUX8EAtIsGOujgePKrOA0tLiqUtd9XCo7wrAFbfvx-leraDKvhL5jABWZPib1U6lKh3ba_XRqFs4wp4UmkkGW0tE9KL7p_2_-x15PTk04sDZN7GLV1FnQ-BMxxg5l9-hHsX4e/s1600/Hatchet_Victims_%2528Hatchet%2529.jpg" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="322" data-original-width="593" height="216" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiSBr7Pp8XpUX8EAtIsGOujgePKrOA0tLiqUtd9XCo7wrAFbfvx-leraDKvhL5jABWZPib1U6lKh3ba_XRqFs4wp4UmkkGW0tE9KL7p_2_-x15PTk04sDZN7GLV1FnQ-BMxxg5l9-hHsX4e/s400/Hatchet_Victims_%2528Hatchet%2529.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
A convoluted legend is never far from the fabric of an original horror film, and Adam Green’s deliriously violent “Hatchet” discovers one of the more interesting of recent memory. Somewhere in the haunted bayous of New Orleans exists the image of a monstrous force, a disfigured man who died long ago in a terrible accident and returns, each night, to stalk the woods in search of his lost father. Unfortunate bystanders who wander nearby are destined to become victims of his murderous rampage, but so rare has their obligatory fate been this ambitiously macabre: in the course of just 85 minutes, the villain is seen prying a skull off someone by the upper jaw, cutting through a man’s spinal column with a machete, beheading countless screaming teenagers and even dismembering one with a belt sander. In the murky depths of Crystal Lake, Jason Vorhees must be sick with envy. But is the terror of one Victor Crowley a cause of some deeply established voodoo curse, or did the poor boy really survive his ordeal in order to carry out his angry mission? That riddle is at the center of an otherwise superfluous mystery, in a movie that has the distinction of being relentlessly delightful while it is inspiring our pained winces.<br />
<a name='more'></a><br />The movie is almost too spirited for words. Some, rightfully, might suggest that our comic responses are signs of a collective desensitization. Others still will regard it all as an involuntary impulse, the result of needing a release from visual gimmicks that have no moral restriction. In truth, “Hatchet” is akin to the spirited bravado of Sam Raimi’s “Evil Dead 2,” made with the cheerful self-awareness of a filmmaker who was smiling vindictively from behind a camera that never looked away from the overzealous splatters or torn flesh. If we enjoyed ourselves, it’s because we could look beyond the grotesque exterior and sense their relentless sarcasm. Meandering beneath 85 minutes of grotesque impulses scattered throughout “Hatchet” is the same exact philosophy, shamelessly exploiting the painful and repugnant possibilities of low-tech showmanship without underlining it in any notions of sincerity. At some point we cease observing the mangled ghost of Crowley as a villain and more as a Darwinian warning – because anyone stupid enough to wander too close to a terrible legend without listening to the wise advice of others is fair game in his nightly slaughterhouse.<br />
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The legend of Victor Crowley is in the tradition of the greatest of high-profile horror movies villains. Born disfigured and eccentric in the murky depths of the bayou, Victor Crowley spent much of his life isolated in a remote cabin by his loving father, who was also widowed by his birth. Unfortunately, local boys knew enough of the mysterious and deformed boy to torment him from a distance, and that lead to the fateful night when his legend was born: the young bullies set fire to his cabin while he was trapped inside, and senior Crowley inadvertently killed his frightened child while attempting to hack down the front door. Years passed on and his father eventually died broken-hearted, providing the key emotional morsel that would allow the spirit of the angry boy to return to Earth and stalk the swamp each night, ready to avenge his father, whom he realizes was only trying to protect him from the cruelty of others. In adult form, Victor Crowley is presented not as a ghostly apparition, but as a muscled brute in suspenders that is a cross between Sloth from “The Goonies” and the creature in “Predator.” Green never bothers to obscure detail of him, either; in the dim light of the marsh, somehow the only beams of visible moonlight are able to center directly on the faces of the key players, especially at the pivotal moments where a massacre is ready to transpire.<br />
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And boy, what a massacre it is! The body count of “Hatchet” is especially significant given the brief length of the picture, minus an initial 20 minutes of setup and exposition. Some of the prospective victims are perfunctory: Ben (Joel David Moore) is a guru of supernatural phenomenon on vacation in New Orleans in order to forget about a painful breakup; Marcus (Deon Richmond) is his best friend, whose mind is more on chasing girls than consoling grieving buddies; Shawn (Parry Shen) is a tour guide who plays up the legend without realizing its validity; Misty (Mercedes McNab) is an aspiring actress too dimwitted to realize her cameraman is only interested in seeing her bare breasts; and Marybeth (Amara Zaragoza) is the brooding, secretive spectator who may have a personal stake in the legend, which has apparently claimed the lives of her brother and father in the opening credits. Are any of them equipped to deal with the fallout of their foolish decision, which will claim the lives of nearly all who occupy their tour boat through the swamp? The conventional wisdom of slashers is that someone, at least, must remain alive in order to provide the proper connection for a sequel. Care to guess who that will be?<br />
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The movie is a triumphant reminder of the plausibility of physical showmanship. Not a single shot of Crowley’s mayhem is displayed by computers; the blood splatters, torn ligaments, beheadings, stabbings, slashings and wounds caused by power tools are all delivered using physical gimmicks, recalling the glory days of horror when there was nothing else to rely on other than the imagination of makeup artists. One of the more sensational displays, however coarse, occurs at the onset of the discovery, as an elderly couple is marching up towards an abandoned house in the woods in search of help. Crowley appears out of nowhere and takes a machete to one, in a scene that is prolonged by both his hysterical agony and the verbal shock of the onlooking ensemble. Then, in a move that is as skillful as it is shocking, he rips off the wife’s head while leaving her lower jaw and neck in tact; the camera spies the remains with some level of detail, perhaps to validate our suspicions that the effects wizards never wound up falling asleep in anatomy school.<br />
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If I make this all sound more amusing than it should be, ask yourself this: is any of the aforementioned gore any worse in “Evil Dead?” Does it not resemble the more celebrated nature of Giallo pictures, which are rarely taken seriously despite dealing with much more somber meanings? Green’s influences are far more irreverent; he lacks the sincerity of, say, a John Carpenter or a Tobe Hooper, but is not content to hold back on the extremities. A less capable filmmaker might not have managed it as well. So, too, could this material have seemed awkward or mismanaged, had it dealt with a flesh-and-blood madman with some level of psychology instead of a far-fetched legend. In a way, his intention is in the broader tradition of Hitchcock, who gleefully relished the idea of playing his audience. In both cases, we never know what to expect and are often startled by the outcomes. Furthermore, neither one means to underline their excess with cynicism. “Hatchet” is in that greater tradition: the one that doesn’t mind going all the way with its depravity, provided you understand that there is a breezy ideology fueling the sentiment.<br />
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Written by DAVID KEYES</div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Horror/Comedy
(US); 2006; Rated R; Running Time: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">85 Minutes</span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><u><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Cast:<o:p></o:p></span></u></b></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Kane Hodder: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Victor Crowley</span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Joel David Moore: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Ben</span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Deon Richmond: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Marcus</span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Amara Zaragoza: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Marybeth Dunstan</span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Mercedes McNab: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Misty</span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Parry Shen: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Shawn</span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<span style="mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Produced by </span></span></b><span style="font-size: 10pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Scott Altomare, Sarah J.
Donohue, Sarah Elbert, Roman Kindrachuk, Andrew Mysko and Cory Neal</span><span style="font-size: 10pt;">; <b>Directed and written by </b><span style="mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Adam Green</span></span></div>
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David Keyeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03067794906887523107noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2451838183910864405.post-73483505901816348012020-04-12T20:39:00.000-07:002020-04-12T20:39:03.765-07:00Cats / 1/2* (2019)<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhscvyJ3DURRzBp0gdUDLjg9jJuYvIzcPqvDizDelhD2SjtuEWDyubRKcDlHE2lTDTjYwPZgo2plQOQQBIq3FGaFbaQXh29GTMLtqRosMdj_7GEXRoc0oXijay5Db7X7FQGqxcfKL0WOces/s1600/cats02_750x422.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="422" data-original-width="750" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhscvyJ3DURRzBp0gdUDLjg9jJuYvIzcPqvDizDelhD2SjtuEWDyubRKcDlHE2lTDTjYwPZgo2plQOQQBIq3FGaFbaQXh29GTMLtqRosMdj_7GEXRoc0oXijay5Db7X7FQGqxcfKL0WOces/s400/cats02_750x422.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
Think of a large wad of cash being doused in gasoline, immediately followed by a lit match tossed into the pile. Picture, with some forlorn amazement, a machine that rapidly prints dollar bills as they are guided on a conveyor belt that empties into the mouth of a giant shredder. Fathom the idea that someone, somewhere, could make “Cats” with a straight face, and you get an impression of how deep these thoughts must run as they regard their own endeavor with some level of regret. So much money went into this ambitiously misfired movie that every scene must play like a eulogy for all their future endeavors. If it is true, as reports suggest, that the film adaptation of the famous Broadway musical by Andrew Lloyd Weber was financed to be made with over $100 million in assets, it is worth lamenting the high cost of modern Hollywood trash. Yet those unlucky enough to find themselves at a screening of said result will most likely be concerned with more direct notions: namely, how such an expensive commodity like this could be released in such an unfinished state, much less be considered salvageable in the first place. Take away all of that, and what remains is a who’s-who of actors who look as if they might be occupied by thoughts of exile from the medium.<br />
<a name='more'></a><br />We as moviegoers are used to the offenses of filmmakers who rely too heavily on subpar visual effects. I am reminded of a handful of dubious blockbusters of the recent past, where CGI has been modulated to totally eviscerate the plausibility of ambitious visual ideas. “Battlefield Earth.” “Lost in Space.” “The Last Airbender.” “Van Helsing.” “10,000 B.C.” These remain templates for technical wizards who strive each day to rise above their underachieving peers, who seemed more interested in cashing paychecks than applying a crisp aesthetic to the products they were marketing. And somehow those who were behind “Cats” can hardly be considered underclassmen, either. Christopher A. Dalton, one of the movie’s chief visual technicians, was in the same role for the most recent “Avengers” pictures, which no one could accuse of being half-hearted. Simon Davey, also on staff, was involved in the production of “Prometheus,” while Maxfield Hemmett is credited for the recent “Overlord.” These are players in a game who come prepared to work, and do so on the fine edge of the craft. So what can be cited as the primary blame for their work in “Cats,” among some of the worst CGI ever released on the big screen? Was their budget too constricting, their time too limiting? Were they working without guidance, set adrift in a composition where no exact rules could be established? Their failure becomes one of the great mysteries of a film that seeks to inspire our loathing for nearly every frame it sits on the screen, and that is before we even attempt to decipher the mediocrity that is the music or the nonexistence of the story.<br />
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My knowledge of “Cats” is limited to vague glimpses from past encounters on home video and internet image galleries, but this much is certain: the musical, one of the longest running in the history of the theatre, was a hot commodity because of the intricate nature of the makeup and costumes, which transformed ordinary actors into agile vessels for the dexterous choreography. For this film translation, director Tom Hooper began with a similar conceit: portray the content with living actors in the roles of the characters, then alter them digitally in post-production to replicate that illusion. The key mistake in his observation: cats are confined to a limited number of sets on stage, where their sense of scale cannot be confused. Now imagine seeing the same beings moving in multi-dimensional environments where they never seem to match the size and perspective of their surroundings, sometimes appearing smaller than a foot stool and at other times as high as a balcony’s railing. Seeing the repetitive inconsistency of this standard recalls the validity of the great warnings of Robert Bresson, who believed that theater would pollute the nature of film more than enhance its value.<br />
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The story, if you can call it one, is basically a series of musical episodes that are barely held together by a thin line of reasoning. In the opening scene, a bag is tossed over a fence and into a dark alley at night in the city, where it is quickly surrounded by awkward-looking humanoid felines. Inside the sack is one Victoria (Francesca Howard), a white female cat who has been abandoned to the streets, now taken up by an ensemble of musical and agile peers who will show her all the key locales in the back alleys of the big city. They are the “Jellicle Cats,” a wise elder cat played by Judi Dench reminds us; early on, they are established as a vague order of loyalists who shun any of those associating with rebellious cats, including Macavity (Idris Elba), whose eyes are fluorescent green and can disappear into a shroud of smoke at will. Is he magic? Or is this just another unspoken facet of the musical’s loose-ended fantasy? Never mind. Victoria soon finds she has more to contend with than fitting in with a faction of singing and dancing alley cats, including disavowing all association from Grizabella (Jennifer Hudson), a sad elder cat who is hissed at whenever she comes near, and Macavity, who kidnaps a host of other cats played by the likes of James Corden, Ian McKellen and Rebel Wilson – for what purpose, your guess is more educated than mine.<br />
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Somewhere in the wall-to-wall musical numbers, the movie establishes a hook: the great elder Deuteronomy (Dench) is tasked to send one feline into the skies where she can be born into a second life, and others must audition for the chance to be chosen. Of course they must. Lloyd Weber’s schtick of conveying every key point through repetitive melody is established ad nauseum here, where all the obligatory familiar faces indulge in solo musical numbers that paint them as sad, desperate nomads in search of something better than the life they have. The bigger, offense, perhaps, is how Hooper chooses to execute the more lighthearted moments. It is clear, of course, that Corden and Wilson were cast in roles that emphasized their comedic skill, but what is the purpose of surrounding them in such cartoonish pomp? Corden looks like a man with fur glued inconsistently on his face, while Wilson is asked to spend nearly an entire sequence rolling around in sexual poses while dancing cockroaches and mice fill the periphery. And if you think the shoddy CGI on the hands and feet of the actors is bad, just take a gander at some of the faces imposed onto the dancing insects: they are so obviously half-assed that a more convincing illusion could have been achieved by pasting magazine heads onto construction paper cutouts.<br />
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Hooper is hardly a novice to this medium. His prior credits include “The Danish Girl,” about a man who discovers himself through life as a transgender, and “The King’s Speech,” which went on to win Best Picture. Both films were well-regarded, which only highlights just how amiss his decision-making is here. Did he learn nothing from “Les Misérables,” which was at least competently made, however overblown? My guess is that he was too drawn to the fantasy of the stage production for him to sway far enough from the aesthetic. A more self-aware voice would have detected the impossibility of this premise, set against a backdrop that required too many vague variables. Cats played by humans are a novelty on a stage; on film, they are invitations to an inconsolable mess. For the life of me, I also could never figure out why all of them danced as if they were in heat, either. Was Hooper trying to suggest that cats are their most inspired when they are feeling sexual? Or is this how he perceives the species? The innuendo is almost jarringly out-of-place in an otherwise emotion-driven movie musical. On the other hand, the movie makes history in one regard: once you remove all the terrible visual effects, “Cats” is basically the first softcore porno ballet ever filmed for the big screen.<br />
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Written by DAVID KEYES</div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Musical
(US); 2019; Rated PG; Running Time: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">110 Minutes</span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><u><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Cast:<o:p></o:p></span></u></b></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Francesca Hayward: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Victoria</span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Jennifer Hudson: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Grizabella</span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Idris Elba: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Macavity</span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Jason Derulo: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Rum Tum Tugger</span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Robbie Fairchild: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Munkustrap</span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Judi Dench: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Old Deuteronomy</span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Rebel Wilson: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Jennyanydots</span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">James Corden: </span></b><span style="font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Bustopher Jones</span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<span style="mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Produced by </span></span></b><span style="font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Tim Bevan, Jo Burn, Eric
Fellner, Debra Hayward, Tom Hooper, Ben Howarth, Andrew Lloyd Weber, Angela
Morrison and Steven Spielberg</span><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">; <b>Directed
by </b><span style="mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Tom Hooper;<b> Written by </b>Lee
Hall and Tom Hooper; </span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">based on the
broadway musical by </b><span style="mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Andrew Lloyd
Weber, </span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">adapted from the poetry of
</b><span style="mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">T.S. Elliot</span></span></div>
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David Keyeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03067794906887523107noreply@blogger.com1