6/22/14: It Came From Space! (Circa 1983 or Thereabouts)

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alien impregnation, alien invasion, aliens, Almost Human, Anthony Amaral III, B-movies, body horror, cinema, directorial debut, drive-in fare, extreme violence, feature-film debut, film reviews, films, Friday the 13th, friendships, gory films, Graham Skipper, Hobo With a Shotgun, horror, horror films, horror movies, Jami Tennille, Joe Begos, John Ethier, lights in the sky, low-budget films, missing friends, Movies, period-piece, psycho killers, sci-fi, sci-fi-horror, science-fiction, set in the 1980's, slasher films, The House of the Devil, UFOs, Vanessa Leigh, violent, writer-director

It’s not much of a secret that modern horror productions seem to be particularly enamored with the 1980s. Whether filmmakers are crafting straight-up remakes of popular ’80s titles or crafting films that are, basically, homages to ’80s horror, such as Gutterballs (2008), The House of the Devil (2009) or Hobo With a Shotgun (2011), the decade between Friday the 13th (1980) and Puppet Master (1989) certainly seems to be fertile soil, as of late. My theory on the reasoning behind this is pretty simple: as the folks who grew up on ’80s horror get older and move into positions where they can begin to create their own content (directors and writers, for sure, but I’m thinking specifically of producers and studios, here), it’s only natural for them to return to the stuff that first fired them up as kids. Whereas previous generations might have been influenced by weekly serials, ’60s-’70s pop-culture/societal issues and the Cold War, the generation of filmmakers who came of age in the ’80s were influenced by their own particular set of issues and found comfort in their own “new” subgenres, such as slasher films and graphic sci-fi/horror combos like Creature (1985) and The Fly (1986). When it finally came time for the “children of VHS” to make their own films, it shouldn’t be surprising that they returned to their formative era: once the folks who grew up in the ’90s begin to take over, we should be seeing lots of rebooted ’90s properties (there’s already a Scream TV series in the works, so the cycle appears to have begun a little early). Life, as Stephen King so eloquently put it, is such a wheel that it always, in the end, comes round to the same place again.

One-man wrecking crew, Joe Begos, is a little young to comfortably fit within my above theory (he was born in 1987, making him a good decade younger than his “peers”) but he fits the bill so perfectly that he must be an old soul. The writer-director-producer-cinematographer-camera operator behind Almost Human (2013) announced his entry to the world of feature filmmaking with a sci-fi horror movie that could have fit perfectly within the ’80s, sandwiched somewhere between Xtro (1983) and The Hidden (1987). Far from being just a clever approximation of a bygone decade, however, Begos’ film manages to combine all of the necessary ingredients (rudimentary acting, gory practical effects, plenty of action sequences, goopy makeup, intense violence) with a loopy sense of energy and comes up with something that’s suitably rough but just endearing enough to make you want to write Begos’ name on your Trapper Keeper. If ever there were a new genre filmmaker to watch, this guy might just be it.

Set in 1987, Almost Human kicks off in sci-fi high-gear with our terrified protagonist, Seth (Graham Skipper, looking like a slightly doughy Daniel Radcliffe), rushing to the cabin of best friend Mark (Josh Ethier) and his wife, Jen (Vanessa Leigh). Seth has just watched as mutual friend Rob was sucked up into the sky, via a shaft of blue light, and the event has him a little unsettled…actually, he’s in a complete panic but why split hairs? Mark is a burly, Brawny Towel-kind of a dude, so he doesn’t seem too ruffled over Seth’s jibber-jabber. Too bad, since Seth is absolutely right: there’s something otherworldly out there and it sucks Mark straight up into the sky, leaving his terrified wife and buddy standing around as the air is filled with intense screeching and blinding, flashing lights. Smash-cut to the title, white letters on a severe, black background and you might be forgiven for thinking you’d booted up the VCR instead of the Blu-Ray.

Two years later and Seth has been cleared as a suspect but nothing else has really gone right for him: Mark and Rob never turned up, Jen moved on to a new guy, Clyde (Anthony Amaral III) and Seth is prone to headaches, nose bleeds and a generally shitty lifestyle. After two years of relative “peace,” however, things have started to happen again: power outages have become common-place again and folks have been seeing weird lights in the sky. Something appears to be brewing and a pair of unfortunate hunters stumble, literally, right into the middle of everything when they happen upon Mark’s naked body in the middle of the woods. Mark seems to be alive but doesn’t seem quite right (he appears to be covered in amniotic fluid which, for a grown, naked man is usually a dead giveaway that shit is not, in face, okay): his eyes look weird, he seems to be in shock and doesn’t say much more than “Jen,” over and over. He also ends up killing the two hunters with his bare hands, which is probably as good an indicator as any that the Mark we now see ain’t the Mark we once knew.

After taking some clothes and a rifle, Mark proceeds into town, cutting a bloody swath through anyone unlucky enough to confront him. His goal appears to be some kind of reconciliation with his former wife but to what end? As Seth finally reconnects with Jen, the two are forced to team up against a truly otherworldly force: you see, Mark is finally home but he’s both a lot less and a lot more than he used to be. What exactly does he want? Why, he just wants what anybody wants: he wants to start a family with the person he loves, that’s all. Unfortunately, Mark’s notions of fatherhood are more in line with Alien (1979) than Leave It To Beaver, leading to a desperate, all-in fight to save humanity from an evil, insidious force from beyond the stars…a force that, like a shark, knows only a few imperatives: eat…procreate…repeat. Can Seth and Jen survive? Can any of us?

From the above description, one could be forgiven for believing that Almost Human is a pretty traditional Alien/Xtro clone about an alien creature that uses humans for feeding and breeding: in reality, the film is actually much closer to a traditional slasher film dolled-up in sci-fi trappings. This actually allows Begos to do two different things: he can create a more traditional slasher, right down to the emphasis on varied methods of death, and he can throw in enough body-horror/sci-fi ickiness to make sure that this doesn’t just read like a Friday the 13th clone. How’s it work out? Pretty damn nicely, to be honest. The slasher elements are strong and well-done, if not particularly inventive (axes, close-range shotguns, scissors and knives all get workouts) but they’re given an additional shot in the arm by the sci-fi elements. While this definitely helps reign the film’s budget in (Begos, like other low-budget horror filmmakers, has learned that the cheapest villains are always the ones who look the most like us, even if they’re filled with aliens/ghosts/mystery juice/a dose of the crazies), the mixture is good enough that it never feels like a cop-out. Indeed, Bego’s sci-fi elements lead to some of the film’s strongest, strangest scenes such as the ooky “pod people” and Mark’s attempted rape/impregnation of Jen via nasty alien tube thingamabopper. Too many scenes of Mark trooping around with a glare and an ax and we get a pretty generic “dead teenager” film: too much outer space mumbo-jumbo and we get the equivalent of one of Corman’s micro-budget ’80s sci-fi curiosities (many of which were the Asylum/Syfy films of their era, as it was). It’s to Begos’ immense credit that the film always feels perfectly balanced: it always feels like a cheaply made B-movie but never feels awkward or disposable.

From a filmmaking standpoint, Almost Human can be hit-or-miss but most of the issues can be chalked up to “first-time filmmaker jitters” or any of the woes normally associated with micro-budget productions: the acting is pretty iffy, the sound mix is absolutely awful (when will low-budget filmmakers ever learn that sound is too fucking important to be handled by whoever has a free hand?) and some of the plot developments felt completely arbitrary, even for a low-budget horror film. That being said, Almost Human never feels sub-standard and is never difficult to watch: whatever minor flaws the film may have, Begos’ cinematography and the film’s editing style aren’t two of them. I’ve seen plenty of low-budget horror films that are practically painful to sit through: wildly inconsistent acting, poor lighting, crappy camera-work, lame scripts and ridiculous CGI effects. While Begos’ film isn’t a masterpiece, it also doesn’t fall prey to any of these potential deal breakers. The acting may be rough but it’s consistently rough, which makes it a lot harder to notice, ironically enough. The lighting and cinematography are good, as are the practical effects (truth be told, the effects work is actually very good, budget notwithstanding) and the script is solid, if less than spectacular.

Ultimately, as a life-long horror fan, it was impossible for me not to be suitably impressed by Begos’ feature-film debut. While the film was far from perfect, it also revealed a genuine love of the genre and an inherent ability that speaks extremely well for future projects (Begos interned with Stuart Gordon, which may go a long way towards explaining not only the younger filmmaker’s “older” aesthetic but also his affinity for nasty effects work). Begos may have been all of three years old when the ’80s slid into the ’90s but his aesthetic (both visually and thematically) is strictly old-school video store. When a 27-year-old writer/director includes a credit listing for a “Fake Shemp” in his debut film, let’s just say that it’s pretty obvious his head (and heart) is in the right place. Anyone who grew up in the era of direct-to-VHS shockers, low-budget slashers and ultra-gory sci-fi chillers should find something to like about Begos’ Almost Human. If you require the relentless polish and shine of “modern,” CGI-endowed horror films, however, look elsewhere: Begos ain’t for you. For me, however, I’m gonna be sure to keep the kid in my sights: after all, if Almost Human is the first lap, I can’t wait to see how this race progresses.

6/5/14 (Part Two): Way Beyond Overdrive

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AC/DC, B-movies, bad films, bad movies, based on a short story, cinema, comet, directorial debut, drive-in fare, Ellen McElduff, Emilio Estevez, Film, film reviews, films, Giancarlo Esposito, Green Goblin, hard-rock soundtrack, horror films, ice cream truck, John Short, Laura Harrington, living machines, Maximum Overdrive, Movies, Night of the Creeps, Pat Hingle, rocket launcher, sci-fi, science-fiction, set in the 1980's, Stephen King, terrible films, truck stop, trucks, Who Made Who, writer-director, Yeardley Smith

There’s a bit of a stigma attached to filmed adaptations of Stephen King novels/stories, something that almost approaches urban legend: with very few exceptions, movies made out of King’s catalog aren’t very good. There are, as mentioned, some pretty popular exceptions, such as Rob Reiner’s adaptation of Stand By Me (1986) and Darabont’s The Green Mile (1999). For the most part, however, King adaptations never seem to get it right, either treating the source material slavishly or managing to completely bungle the tone. By the mid-’80s, King decided to take matters into his own hands, end the curse and write/direct a film version of his short story, “Trucks.” The result could have been the definitive King adaptation: after all, who better to get into the mind of the Master of Horror than the master, himself? The end result, of course, was a bit different: Stephen King’s Maximum Overdrive (1986) is not only one of the worst King adaptations of all time, it’s also one of the worst films of its era. The lesson is blazingly clear: while prose and screenwriting may look awfully similar, they’re two very different beasts and being a master of one means nothing whatsoever in regards to the other. It also makes another point painfully clear: being a best-selling author makes one about as qualified to direct a feature-length film as being a world-class gymnast.

After a short intro sets up the scenario (Earth has passed into the tail of a rogue comet and will remain there for the next eight days), King jumps us right into the action, which makes the biggest flaw of the film all too clear: it’s unrelentingly stupid. King makes an appearance as a bug-eyed yokel who stares stupidly as an electronic marquee-sign changes to read “Fuck you” and an ATM flashes him the message, “You’re an asshole.” As King pops his eyes out (cuz he’s “comically surprised,” dontcha know?) and leans into the camera, he relates the classic line,” Sugarbuns, come look at this: the machine called me an asshole!” Cue AC/DC’s “Who Made Who,” roll the opening credits and give your soul to the movie gods: it’ll gets worse from here.

Like the short story upon which it’s based, Maximum Overdrive concerns a very Kingish scenario: the aforementioned comet has, for some reason, caused all of the machines on Earth to “come to life” and act independently. This means that vehicles drive themselves around, soda machines spit out cans like ammunition, electric carving knives cut through the air as if propelled by invisible hands, drawbridges raise and lower themselves and ATMs call people “asshole.” For the next eight days, humans are no longer the masters of their own technology: machines are mad as hell and they won’t take it any more! After we see a bunch of this chaos in action, including a slapstick scene involving an animate drawbridge and a truck full of watermelons, we finally settle into the truck stop that will form the setting for the remainder of the film. Once there, we meet the usual group of colorful characters: ex-con turned short-order cook, Bill (Emilio Estevez); his sleazy, obnoxious boss, Bubba Hendershot (Pat Hingle); ridiculously melodramatic waitress, Wanda June (Ellen McElduff); truck stop attendants (and fellow ex-cons) Duncan (J.C. Quinn), Joe (Pat Miller) and Brad (Leon Rippy) and random videogame player Giancarlo Esposito (otherwise known as Gus Fring on Breaking Bad).

In short order, as the machines begin to take over the outside world, the small band of survivors are joined by others: newlyweds Curtis (John Short) and Connie (the Simpsons’ Yeardley Smith); hitch-hiker Brett (Laura Harrington) and the sleazy bible salesman that gave her a ride (and tried to feel her up), as well as Duncan’s adorable Little League uniform-adorned son, Deke (Deke Holter). Deke makes his way to the truck stop after surviving a harrowing attack at the diamond that begins innocently enough, with an insane soda machine pelting his coach in the crotch with high-speed cans (Q: What’s funnier than multiple soda cans to the crotch? A: If you’re Stephen King, nothing.) and ends horribly, with said soda machine putting a can through his coach’s head. Yikes: talk about the adverse health affects of sugary beverages!

Once this motley crew all converge on the truck stop, a rampaging group of driverless semi-trucks, led by a particularly nasty toy company truck with a Green Goblin head, pen them in, encircling the truck stop and running over anyone who dares to break free. Anyone familiar with the source material will know that these trucks may be all-powerful (the original story was called “Trucks,” after all) but that they still need a little human touch when it comes to gassing up. In King’s original story, this aspect led to a bleak finale where humanity becomes enslaved to their new mechanical overlords. This time around, however, it’s all rocket launchers, “witty” one-liners (a character actually utters the line “Eat my shorts.” For real. I would not lie to you.) and good ol’ human gumption as Billy leads the survivors in one last, ultimate push against the deadly trucks. I won’t give anything away but let’s just say that “Who Made Who” makes another appearance and that song always brings the party.

There are a lot of reasons why Maximum Overdrive is a pretty awful film but most of them lead directly back to King, whether in his capacity as screenwriter or director. The script, by itself, is dreadful, full of wooden dialogue, zero characterization (Billy and Brett are a couple sorely because it says so right there on the printed page), a bafflingly inconsistent tone (extreme slapstick scenes sit right next to stuff that should cut deeper, such as the aforementioned Little League massacre) and completely arbitrary plot developments. The acting, aside from Estevez, who always manages to rise above the material, is consistently hysterical and over-the-top, none more so than the amazing creature that is Wanda June. For some bizarre reason, Ellen McElduff opts to bring her best Greek tragic acting style to the role, culminating in the scene where she rushes outside and repeatedly hollers, “You can’t! We made you!” at the trucks. She shakes her fists at the heavens, shouts til her veins pop out and even sinks to her knees: it’s a performance that absolutely befits King Oedipus but comes across as ludicrously OTT for a truck stop waitress. If this was an actual directorial/acting choice, it seems bizarre: if this was just an unchecked performance, it doesn’t say much about King’s command of the cast.

Similarly, longtime Simpsons’ voice actor Yeardley Smith (Lisa, among many, many others) makes an appearance here as Connie, one half of the nearly brain-dead duo of Curtis and Connie. Smith is so obnoxiously screechy, so whiny and just flat-out terrible, that she literally grinds the film to a halt whenever she makes an appearance. Forget the character’s motivations, which make not one whit of sense (at one point, Connie seems devastated by the destruction of their car: why treat the car as if it were a dead child?): it’s her obnoxious voice and/or personality that really come across like fingernails on chalkboard. Most of the other actors play their characters fairly broad (Pat Hingle is so damn devious as Bubba that he may as well have cloven hoofs) but McElduff and Smith deserve a special place in this film’s Hall of Shame.

Despite the massed silliness on display here (or perhaps because of it, who knows), Maximum Overdrive does possess a certain gonzo “so-bad-it’s-okay” charm that makes the film an easy watch (especially in a part environment). It will never be mistaken for anything approaching a good film (compare this with Fred Dekker’s Night of the Creeps, also from the same year, to see how to make a really great B-movie) but it certainly has its moments. The Green Goblin-faced truck is a pretty great adversary, even if it doesn’t get any lines or do much more than drive around and look menacing. There’s also a nicely realized gag involving a driverless ice-cream truck playing Roger Miller’s “King of the Road,” which easily amounts to the film’s most mature joke. As previously mentioned, Estevez is really good: he’s one of those actors who can keep my eyes glued to the screen even when he’s the only thing worth watching. I must also admit to throwing more than my fair share of devil-horns into the air during the film, as well: when the score consists entirely of AC/DC tunes (including “Hell’s Bells” and “Highway to Hell”), some headbanging must be expected, although their actual “score” contributions amount to little more than random guitar riffs that spring up during the film’s various action sequences. Regardless, no film can be truly worthless when AC/DC is involved.

Ultimately, your capacity to appreciate Maximum Overdrive will depend entirely on your tolerance for Z-grade schlock entertainment. While King’s directorial debut is sloppy, silly and nonsensical, it’s also propulsive and mercifully short. Pair this with another B-movie (as I did with Night of the Creeps) and you’re looking at a fairly amusing experience. Luckily for the world, King took the hint here and hasn’t returned to the director’s chair: although his first effort managed to cram a Simpson’s reference, flying watermelons, killer trucks and Pat Hingle into the same film, perhaps it’s better for us all if he just sticks to literature.

 

6/5/14 (Part One): Your Date’s Here!

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1980's, aliens, Allan Kayser, B-movies, black-and-white cinematography, Bradster, Bruce Solomon, Christopher Romero, cinema, Corman University, cult classic, cult films, Cynthia Cronenberg, David Paymer, Det. Ray Cameron, Detective Landis, Dick MIller, drive-in fare, favorite films, film reviews, films, frat boys, fraternities, Fred Dekker, frozen bodies, horror films, horror references, horror-comedies, House, infections, Jason Lively, Jill Whitlow, killer slugs, meteor, Movies, Night of the Creeps, pledge week, pop culture references, Ray Cameron, Robert C. New, Robert Kino, Robert Kurtzman, Roger Corman, sci-fi, science-fiction, set in the 1950's, set in the 1980's, Sgt. Raimi, small town life, Steve Marshall, teenagers, The Monster Squad, Tom Atkins, unibrow, unibrows, wisecracking cops, writer-director, zombie frat boys, zombies

There’s a fine art that goes into making a truly fun, trashy B-horror film. If the film is too lo-fi, charmless and crude, it can be a chore to sit through. If the film is too goofy and self-aware, it can be overly silly and lightweight. Just right, however, like that proverbial porridge, and the mixture can be truly magical. I’ve had a big problem warming to modern-day B-films like Snakes on a Plane (2006) and Sharknado (2013), finding them to be way too self-aware and, quite frankly, overly obnoxious: shrill, unpleasant characters and ridiculously shoddy CGI don’t do much for me. For my money, I’ve always preferred B-movies from the ’80s, finding them to be warmer, more personable and less interested in self-reference than films from later eras. As someone who’s always appreciated practical effects, ’80s B-horror films provided plenty of memorable moments.

Perhaps Scream (1996) was too successful at pointing out the foibles of the horror genre because many horror films that followed it seemed less like individual pieces than attempts at genre critique and re-invention. The true key to making a good B-movie is to set out to make a good film, period: trying to make a good “bad” film is a fool’s errand. As far as I’m concerned, some of the most honest, entertaining, funny and well-made B-horror films have come out of the extraordinarily fertile time-period between 1983-1989. No discussion of this era, as far as I’m concerned, could be complete without giving due props to one of its most interesting filmmakers: Fred Dekker. Dekker may not have the deep and extensive filmography of some of his peers but he bears the distinction of being directly responsible for three of the best B-horror films of the 1980s: he wrote the screenplay for the minor/Miner classic House (1986) and wrote/directed the unmitigated awesomeness that were Night of the Creeps (1986) and The Monster Squad (1987). Although Night of the Creeps may not be quite as well-known as The Monster Squad (Drac, Frank and Wolfie trump alien slugs, apparently), it’s every bit as good: fast-paced, endlessly clever, funny and genuinely creepy, Night of the Creeps is the epitome of classic drive-in fare.

After a spartan credits sequence which recalls the credits for Carpenter’s Halloween (1978) in its simplicity, we’re tossed into outer space for a truly gonzo opening: fleshy, pink aliens that look like combinations of Teletubbies and Xenomorphs run around a space ship, shooting cheesy lasers at each other, on-screen subtitles translating their gibberish-speak. An alien escapes, via pod, leading us straight to Sorority Row, circa 1959, where we get some great black and white cinematography, plenty of clever references to ’50s genre films, an escaped serial killer (with an ax), necking teens on Lovers’ Lane, alien slugs and a jilted ex-boyfriend/cop. A slashing axe smash cuts straight to Pledge Week, circa 1986, complete with vibrant color. The whole opening sequence has taken all of ten minutes of screen-time and the message is clear: we’re in the hands of a master, so kick back and enjoy the ride.

In short order, we meet our heroes: Chris (Jason Lively) is the typical 1980s “nice guy/shy nerd” while his best buddy, J.C. (Steve Marshall) is the typical “quirky, brash, smart-assed, outsider best friend with a heart of gold.” They’re freshmen at Corman University, where Chris pines for the lovely Cynthia (Jill Whitlow). She’s a Kappa Delta, however, and dating the president of the obnoxious Beta fraternity, Brad (Allan Kayser). What’s a nice guy to do besides try to pledge the Betas and win her heart? Since this is an ’80s-genre film, however, it’s never going to be that easy. After the Betas send wannabe-pledges Chris and J.C. to go steal a body from the campus medical lab, things really start to warm up: literally, as the cyrogenically-frozen body they steal (a body that astute viewers should remember from the opening) seems to come to life and wander about the campus. Looks like a job for Det. Ray Cameron (Tom Atkins), the jilted boyfriend from the opening, who’s now a “damaged,” hard-drinking cop with a catch-phrase (“Thrill me”) and enough ennui to choke the aristocracy.

As Det. Cameron tries to figure out how a 27-years-dead corpse just gets up and walks away, Chris and JC begin to notice strange things happening around campus. Soon, Corman University is in the grip of a full-bore alien-brain-slug invasion (another alien-brain-slug invasion? Geez…) and it’s up to our heroes, along with Cynthia and the cynical detective, to make it all right. What happens when the brain-slugs come upon an entire overturned bus full of frat boys, as well as one long-dead axe murderer? Well, let’s just say that all hell breaks loose and leave it at that. Love…duty…pledging…Bullwinkle Moose…brain slugs…alien bounty-hunters…it’s just another day at good ol’ Corman U!

If the opening featuring the Teletubbie-esque aliens was no giveaway, let me be a little more clear: Night of the Creeps has its tongue planted so firmly in its cheek that it pokes through the other side…and that’s a distinctly good thing. Not only is the script and dialogue genuinely funny (Det. Cameron is a hoot and J.C.’s wisecracks land more often than they miss) but the film possesses a level of self-awareness that manages to skip right past “easy, obnoxious references” (although there are plenty of those) and straight to the core of traditional B-horror/sci-fi films. Across the board, Night of the Creeps manages to nail its various targets quite ably: one of the best examples is the exceptionally broad, silly acting that characterizes the opening ’50s-era footage. While the performances would be eye-rolling in any other context, they’re a perfect fit for the kind of cheesy ’50s-sci-fi/drive-in fare that Dekker and crew are trying to reference. Likewise, the “present-day” stuff perfectly references various horror products from the ’80s without losing the cheerful, goofy tone of the earlier material. It’s a delicate balancing act but Night of the Creeps manages to not only reference but subtly comment on these different eras (the black and white cinematography is, of course, just more icing on the cake).

One of the most obvious in-jokes in the film, albeit a joke that’s revealed gradually, involves the names of the various characters. The film takes place at Corman University, which should be a pretty easy “get” for most casual fans. Beyond that, however, it becomes a bit of a free-for-all: James Carpenter “J.C.” Hooper…Chris Romero…Cynthia Cronenberg…Detective Landis…Sgt. Raimi…Det. Ray Cameron…it’s sort of a “greatest-hits” of ’70s-’80s genre greats. We even get the real thing, in a way, when Corman regular Dick Miller makes an appearance as Walter, the cop in charge of weapon lockup at Det. Cameron’s precinct (fans might remember that Miller’s character in the classic A Bucket of Blood (1959) was named Walter Paisley). The fan services bits like this are a nice touch and, although a bit heavy-handed later in the film (the scene where Chris and J.C.’s names are revealed is so on-the-nose that it spoils the gag just a little), give a nice sense of unity to the proceedings.

While many of the jokes in Night of the Creeps are related to the horror/sci-fi genre, there’s still plenty of general hilarity to be found throughout. Whether it’s Cro-Magnon football bro Steve’s amazing unibrow (seriously: this piece of facial fuzz deserves its own end credit), the bathroom graffiti that enthusiastically affirms that “Stryper Rules!” (cuz, you know, they never did), Det. Cameron’s wisecracks (“Thrill me” never gets old and leads to a truly fist-raising finale) or Chris explaining his misidentification of a particular frat house as “It’s all Greek to me,” Night of the Creeps constantly moves from one great, funny moment to another. By the time we get to the iconic scene where Det. Cameron gives the girls of Kappa Delta the good/bad news (“The good news is your dates are here…bad news is, they’re dead”), Dekker’s script has proven itself time and time again.

The key thing to look for in B-movies like this is always going to be the “fun factor” and Night of the Creeps is consistently off-the-charts in this area. This is the kind of film that’s perfect for a rowdy get-together, a weekend trash-movie marathon or a drive-in in the heart of summertime. While the film doesn’t necessarily shy away from gooey special effects, it doesn’t wallow in them, either: the practical effects, which feature future KNB founder Robert Kurtzman, are pretty great (particularly the eye-popping bit where the long-dead axe murderer gets a new lease on life) but they never choke the life out of the film.

As a whole, almost everything in Night of the Creeps works spectacularly well. The acting is uniformly strong (although Jason Lively’s Chris is a bit of a wet blanket), the aforementioned effects work is great and the cinematography, by industry vet Robert. C. New (Prom Night (1980), The Borrower (1991), Rapture-palooza (2013)), is uniformly excellent. Indeed, Night of the Creeps has to be one of the best-looking, most vibrantly colored B-horror films to ever grace the silver screen. Truth be told, there really isn’t much not to like here, although the ridiculously stereotypical Asian janitor, Mr. Miner (Robert Kino), comes perilously close to being in rather poor taste: it’s no worse than many ’80s-era depictions of Asian characters (and quite a bit more gentle, to be honest) but feels completely out-of-place in the film’s good-natured universe. That notwithstanding, however, Night of the Creeps is one of the very best B-horror films to come out of the 1980s. Whether you’re looking for a great way to kill time or a great way to get the party started, Dekker’s Night of the Creeps has you covered. In fact, I’m inclined to call it the “Citizen Kane of alien-brain-slug/zombie frat boy” films. If you can find a better one, I’ll buy and eat a hat.

6/1/14 (Part Two): Friends, Zombies, Fellow Men in the Country…

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actor-director, actor-writer, B-movies, backwoods folk, Billy Ray, Buck WIld, chupacabra, cinema, co-writers, Dru Lockwood, dude ranch, dumb films, Edgar Wright, film reviews, films, guys' weekend, horror, horror films, horror movies, horror-comedies, hunting, Isaac Harrison, isolated communities, Jerrod Pistilli, Joe Stevens, Mark Ford, Matthew Albrecht, Meg Cionni, Movies, rednecks, Shaun of the Dead, Tom and Jerry, Tyler Glodt, white trash, writer-director, zombie films, zombie movies, zombies

By this point in world history, plain ol’ “vanilla” zombie films don’t really have much effect anymore. Sure, they may be one of the easiest low-budget productions for fledgling filmmakers to get involved in (Got some friends, a camera and a location? Guess what, Jack: you just got yourself the beginnings of a zombie film!) but that also means that we’ve been drowning in this kind of direct-to-video filler for a good thirty years, at this point. Once the “prosumer” camera revolution occurred, it was even easier for filmmakers to pump out this kind of product and it seems that zombie films have been multiplying like Tribbles within the last decade or so. In order to inject a bit of life into the subgenre, filmmakers have turned to various ways to “spruce” up the ol’ gut-munchers, the most popular of which involves slamming comedy and the zombie film together, chocolate and peanut butter-style, to create an entirely new (well, kind of new) sub-subgenre: the zom-com.

While Edgar Wright’s Shaun of the Dead (2004) definitely wasn’t the first zom-com (I’d give that title to Dan O’Bannon’s outrageous 1985 yuk/yuck-fest The Return of the Living Dead), it’s probably (still) the most popular one, as well as the first to take the “zom-com” tag and run with it. In the decade since Simon Pegg and the lads tried to forestall a zombie invasion of the UK, there have been several fistfuls of zom-coms, ranging in quality from “drop-dead hilarious” to “just drop dead, already.” In a fairly glutted field, I’m managed to see several worthy successors to Shaun of the Dead: Fido (2006) was an ingenious melding of zom-coms with candy-colored 1950’s nostalgia, while Cockneys vs Zombies (2012) managed to overcome a terribly generic title with solidly-paced jokes and thrills. And, of course, who could forget Woody Harrelson and Jesse Eisenberg trading quips in Zombieland (2009)? Mixing zombie chills with chuckles isn’t the easiest task but, when done well, the results can be lots of fun. Unfortunately, Buck Wild (2013), the newest feature from the team of Tyler Glodt and Matthew Albrecht, isn’t so much a “big, dumb blast” as a “really dumb film,” only slightly less stupid than the head-smackingly awful ’80s Troma film Redneck Zombies (1989).

Buck Wild starts promisingly, if crudely, with a fairly funny segment involving beleaguered father Clyde (Joe Stevens), his perpetually horny daughter, Candy (Meg Cionni) and her stupid boyfriend. After decking the boyfriend with a wrench (humping his daughter in the garden is one thing, stepping all over the flowers is a whole other bucket of manure), Clyde ends up getting attacked by a chupacabra. Yes, a chucacabra, ladies and gentlemen. We that, we seem to be off to the races, establishing a crude, fun and extremely tongue-in-cheek attitude.

Unfortunately, the good will begins to fade as the movie proper begins, mostly because we get saddled with a pretty obnoxious group of protagonists. Our “hero” is Craig (co-writer Matthew Albrecht), one of those perpetually put-upon, straight-arrow types that exists solely to become irritated by various indignities. His “best friend,” Lance (Isaac Harrison) is a ridiculously metrosexual “ladies’ man” who happens to be boinking Craig’s girlfriend, Carla (Amerlia Meyers), unbeknownst to our “hero.” The little group is rounded out by Tom (Dru Lockwood) and Jerry (Jarrod Pistilli), who seem to serve as a perpetually at-odds odd couple: you know, cuz they’re named Tom and Jerry? Like the cartoons? The ones with the mouse and cat? Yeah, it just ain’t funny no matter how you slice it, is it? Tom is the typical mealy-mouthed, glasses-wearing dork: we’ve seen at least a million iterations of this character in just the last couple years, nevermind the last couple decades. Jerry, however, is the real prize in this Cracker Jack box: bedecked in a ridiculous fedora, given to smoking cigars in small cars and practicing his nunchuks in the nude, Jerry is supposed to be the epitome of the batshit crazy outsider, that one guy who just…does not…give a FUCK, bro! Except he’s a colossal weenie, sort of a gene-splice between Crispin Glover and Bobcat Goldthwait’s award-winning performance in the Police Academy movies. As such, not only is it impossible to buy the scene where he puts the cigar out on his own hand (cuz this guy totally looks like he would start bawling) but it’s almost offensive to believe that this nitwit occupies the “badass” role in the film. When your bar is that low, no good can come of it, mark my words.

The plot, such as it is, involves one of those “guys-only weekends,” this one ostensibly set-up to allow for not only some male bonding but some animal-shooting, as well. The “gang” heads to the Buck Wild Ranch (Hey! That’s the name of the film! Clever!), which just happens to be run by Clyde. Clyde’s not looking too good and if you’ve seen any zombie films besides this one, you’ll know why. Besides being infected by a chupacabra, Clyde’s also kind of a dick: he calls the guys “punks” and “pissants” (put up your dukes!) and tells them to make sure to stay within the borders of the ranch. Turns out that Clyde’s next-door neighbor is a self-proclaimed “badass” named Billy Ray (Mark Ford) and he doesn’t take kindly to trespassers. The guys end up running afoul of Billy Ray (an absolutely, astoundingly terrible creation that seems to be part frat-boy, part John Waters, part lame-ass rockabilly clothes horse and completely, totally unbelievable) and a completely awful park ranger, Officer Shipley (director/co-writer Tyler Glodt), which don’t really expand the narrative so much as pad it out. Ultimately, they also run afoul of zombies: turns out Clyde has been infecting other locals and, soon, our city slickers are up to their haircuts in the redneck dead. Revelations are had, truths are learned, friends turn into the walking dead, Jerry acts like a badass, yadda yadda yadda. If the ultimate destination of this one-legged mule isn’t readily apparent by the end of the first act…I’m guessing you might actually enjoy this. Hmm…

Look, I’m not gonna sugarcoat this at all: Buck Wild is a stupid film. Aggressively stupid. Worse yet, it’s a hyperactive, self-aware, tone-deaf kind of stupidity that reminds me more of films like Scary Movie (2000) than Shaun of the Dead. Let me give you a good example of the “humor” on display here. After Officer Shipley pulls the guys over because he’s heard “enough gunshots for Baghdad,” he proceeds to stand outside his car and give them a speech about how if you smell shit, you’re probably standing in it. Officer Shipley, it turns out, smells shit: guess what, he asks them. You’re standing in shit, the others point out. And he is…he really is standing in a big pile of shit. Now, if anything about that was humorous (keep in mind that the “delivery” of said “joke” doesn’t help things), Buck Wild just may be right up your alley. Lest we think that the writers only have one kind of joke up their sleeve, they also show us how hilarious and timely their references are: Tom ends up a captive at Billy Ray’s compound and Jerry goes to save him, in a scene that features an ultra-sleazy brass song, Tom bent over a table wearing only his underwear and Jerry wielding a samurai sword. Yeah, that’s right: it’s a fucking Pulp Fiction reference. Not only that, but it’s a “humorous” reference to the rape scene: now that’s comedy!

Lest it sound like Buck Wild is completely worthless, there are actually three elements of the film that really work. The first element is the cinematography, which is consistently well-done and clear: in low-budget films like this, you’re usually lucky if you get something that looks half-way decent, let alone good. The second element that works (spectacularly well, I might add) are the fake TV shows that we occasionally see. One of them, a public access show called “Fucking Hunting” that features Billy Ray and his motley crew, is an absolute scream, miles away the funniest thing in the film. Hot on its heels, however, is another gem of a fake show, this one called “Living Through the Gray,” a self-help show about dealing with color-blindness. The TV shows are not only the funniest moments in the film, hands down, but they’re actually two of the funniest moments I’ve seen in any film recently: it’s a shame that they’re left to die amid the humorless wasteland that is the rest of the film.

The third element that actually works in Buck Wild is an extremely smart and subversive little commentary on the casual female nudity that inundates most low-mid budget horror films. Unlike similar films that might feature a terrified young starlet running around topless, Buck Wild chooses to make Tom the object of the “male gaze.” For the majority of the film, due to one incident or another, Tom rarely wears more than his underwear and socks: at one point, he fashions a toga out of a garbage bag, only to have a zombie rip it to shreds. Later, he gets to take a shower and emerges, clad in a bathrobe, only to have a passing zombie yank it off, exposing him once again. I’ll be honest: this particular running gag never got old and displayed the kind of invention and thought that I wish the rest of the film possessed. I don’t actually recall any female nudity at all, to be honest, although we get plenty of Tom. In some ways, this seems to be a callback to the Pee Wee character in Porkys (1982), who likewise spends the majority of that film in a constant state of embarrassment, harassment and undress. While the film often seems to be exceptionally mean to Tom, it ends up paying off big dividends, especially during a nicely emotional final setpiece.

Ultimately, however, a few worthy elements don’t a worthy film make. If Buck Wild were just a little less inane and stupid, it would be mighty easy to recommend it as the kind of low-budget romp that it thinks it is. Unfortunately, the film mostly ends up being a showcase of missed opportunities and foul balls, with nary a true home run in the batch (unless we count the TV shows, which really only amount to 2-3 minutes of screen-time, max). While I’m more than willing to give Glodt and Albrecht another chance, there’s no way I would put these guys on my radar: Fool me once, fool me twice and all that jazz.

5/30/14 (Part One): Beware the Melty Man

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'70s films, '70s-era, 1970's cinema, Alex Rebar, All Buy Mice Elf Film Festival, astronauts, B-movies, body horror, Burr DeBenning, cannibalism, cinema, drive-in fare, film reviews, films, horror, horror films, horror movie, Jonathan Demme, melting people, Movies, Myron Healey, Rick Baker, sci-fi, science-fiction, special effects, special-effects extravaganza, Steve West, Ted Nelson, The Incredible Melting Man, William Sachs, writer-director

While iconic villains are a vital component to horror films (particularly franchises), they’re also one of the most difficult aspects of a film to nail. Despite the exponential increase in the sheer number of horror films, we haven’t really added many “classic” villains to the roster since the ’80s: while characters like Laid to Rest’s (2009) ChromeSkull and Hatchet’s (2006) Victor Crowley have been in a few films, by this point, they’ve yet to achieve any sort of cultural resonance. One could argue that Leprechaun’s (1993) titular character counts, since he’s now been featured in seven different films (after all, Freddy only had a total of 9 films, including the recent reboot). As with ChromeSkull and Crowley, however, the Leprechaun never really made it to Buzz Bin status: he’s working-class but no hero. There have been many attempts to spawn a new horror icon, over the years, but very few ever end up taking off. One of the strangest of these attempts to craft a bit of zeitgeist came about in 1977 with The Incredible Melting Man, a B-movie with pretensions to immortality.

Despite some pretty impressive makeup effects by a young Rick Baker and a tagline that explicitly announced the filmmakers’ intentions (“The first new horror creature”), The Incredible Melting Man did not go on to spawn a franchise…or even a sequel, as it were. Whether audiences had a hard time associating with the gloopy titular monster or whether the (decidedly rough) production-quality put them off makes little difference. As it stands, The Incredible Melting Man is a complete failure at creating a lasting legacy but pretty successful as a goofy, gory popcorn film.

Astronaut Steve West (Alex Rebar) is part of an expedition to fly through the rings of Saturn when something goes wrong: his nose begins to bleed, things get fuzzy and he wakes up in a hospital. After removing his facial bandages, Steve notices something: he doesn’t look too hot. In fact, he seems to be rotting. This kinda ticks him off (wouldn’t it bother you?) and he pounds the table, apeman-style, before trashing the examination room. A nurse returns in time to get chased by Steve in a scene filmed with the kind of gauzy slo-mo that usually ended ’70s horror films, not began them. She crashes through a glass door (saved a second on opening it, I suppose), Steve’s right there and it’s “Good night, nurse!”

We now meet Dr. Ted Nelson (Burr DeBenning) and Dr. Loring (Lisle Wilson) as they examine the nurse’s body. Ted knows a little about this situation, since he was Steve’s friend and was involved with the Saturn mission. He’s also the most laid-back, unflappable, milquetoast “hero” of all time: the scene where he describes to Dr. Loring how his wife, Judy (Ann Sweeny), is pregnant with their third child, after two previous miscarriages, has all of the emotional impact of a colonoscopy. Any “clues” he turns up along the way will be greeted with the mild distaste that one might express when finding caterpillars on the cabbages: Ted Nelson may be the “hero” in The Incredible Melting Man but the guy would be a zero just about anywhere else.

As poor Steve stomps around the countryside, leaving gloopy handprints here, a bit of his ear there (“Oh God…it’s his ear,” exclaims Ted, in a way that practically screams “Could I possibly have a refill on my glass of water, please, if it’s not too much of a bother?”) and dead bodies everywhere, Ted is forced to get General Perry (Myron Healey) involved. Together, Ted and the General set out to stop Steve’s killing spree, albeit for different reasons: the General wants all traces of this disaster dead and gone, while Ted only wants to help out his soupy buddy. It all comes to a head at some kind of a factory, where Ted’s friendship will be stretched to the limit and Steve will have to try, if only for a moment, to regain his basic humanity.

When The Incredible Melting Man is rough, it’s really rough. The acting is rudimentary, at best, with some performances being so howlingly terrible that they achieve a kind of gonzo spectacle. Alex Rebar, in particular, is awful: were he to stay “normal” throughout the film, the movie would actually be unwatchable, although getting buried in the melting man makeup restricts his performance to strictly physical, which works wonders. While Burr DeBenning is nowhere near as terrible, he manages to possess as much energy and life as a department-store mannequin (and not the ’80s kind, either). In the world of the over-actors, the under-actor is king and DeBenning rules his roost from a godly height. The musical score is also pretty ludicrous: the final pursuit in the factory is scored by some of the cheesiest wah-wah guitar possible, along with a pathetic rip-off of John Williams Jaws theme.

Among the shoddier filmmaking aspects are some genuinely “so-bad-it’s-great” moments. My personal favorite has to be the one where Steve steps on the fisherman’s sandwich. It’s the oddest, most awkward and just plain confounding scene in the entire film (which is saying a lot): for some reason, we get a close-up of a plastic “monster” foot (think Gwar) stomping awkwardly on a sandwich, as if the “actor” accidentally tripped and was immortalized on film. Another forehead-slapper would have to be Judy’s ridiculously horny mother and step-father, who stop for a little hanky-panky and orange picking in the middle of the night and get a nasty Steve-sized surprise: not only are the actors terrible (bested only by their avatar, Alex Rebar) but the situation makes no sense whatsoever.

Far from being a complete waste of film and time, however, The Incredible Melting Man is actually quite charming, believe it or not. It will never be accused of being a good film, mind you, but it’s a pretty great B-movie. The movie is definitely cheesy (and very, very soupy) but it’s also got a surprising amount of pathos wrapped up within the idiocy. Steve West, when he’s not talking, is a tremendously sympathetic creature and not so far removed from Frankenstein’s Monster or The Wolf Man. He’s a normal man, with normal friends and a normal life, who is completely destroyed by forces outside his command. He’s turned into a monster, hunted by the very government who facilitated his transformation and has his waning sense of humanity constantly appealed to by his former best friend. Steve West is no sadistic Freddy or Wishmaster: rather, he’s a pitiable creature who seems to take no joy in his mayhem. There’s one moment that perfectly illustrates the two halves of this character: after he’s turned into a completely horrifying, shambling mess, Steve looks down into a water-filled barrel, right at his reflection. As he stares, a drop of pus, like a tear, falls into the water, rippling the image. Say what you want but it’s a powerful, subtle moment that manages to perfectly blend pathos and ick factor: in other words, it’s a picture-perfect horror movie moment.

Too much can’t be said about Rick Baker’s phenomenal special effects, which really give the film a sense of identity. While the makeup starts off a tad bit rough, we’re in glorious hardcore mode once Steve really gets to rottin’. At first, I was wondering whether the version of the film I recently watched was censored: an early shot of the dead nurse seems surprisingly tame and cut-off and there’s some weird editing going on. Once we get to the shot of the fisherman’s body, however, complete with ripped-open ribcage and a severed head, it’s pretty clear that not much hit the cutting room floor. Truth be told, The Incredible Melting Man, as befits its moniker, gets severely goopy, so much so that it begins to resemble one of those extended Family Guy vomiting scenes. If your stomach isn’t fairly cast-iron, chances are that Steve’s melted-wax look is really going to rumble your guts: make it through enough of the film, however, and it kind of fades into the background, sort of like all the nudity in Showgirls (1995). For my part, some of the most stomach-churning stuff came from scenes like the one where an unsuspecting young girl puts her hand into a nice, sticky bit of Steve slop: the thought, alone, is undeniably gross but the practical effects make it even worse. Ditto for the final melting scene, which would be echoed a decade later in the gross-out classic Street Trash (1987). While Street Trash would plumb it for laughs, The Incredible Melting Man goes straight for the heart-strings, reminding us that the disgusting pile of wet, red something on the ground used to be a pretty average (if terribly hammy) dude.

While The Incredible Melting Man may not have succeeded in adding another indelible villain to the collective conscience, it ended up being a more than worthy B-movie. It’s not hard to imagine couples going to see this at the drive-in, covering their eyes whenever Steve shambles up into the camera-eye. For folks who grew up on this kind of sensational, B-movie fare, The Incredible Melting Man should more than fit the bill for a night of nostalgia. Just be sure to keep this one away from the dinner hour: for once, this is all about truth in advertising.

5/25/14: Those Belmont Avenue Blues

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apartment-living, B-movies, bad cops, bad films, bad movies, cinema, co-directors, co-writers, David Pasquesi, film reviews, films, Hezekiah Confab, horror-comedies, independent films, indie comedies, John LaFlamboy, Justin DiGiacomo, landlords, low-budget films, Mary Seibel, Mike Bradecich, missing pets, Movies, obnoxious cops, Police Academy, Robert Englund, slumlords, terrible films, The Mole Man of Belmont Avenue, Tim Kazurinsky, writer-director-actor, X-Zanthia

There’s a fine art to making a “good” bad film, almost a recipe, if you will. You need to begin with tons of energy: lack-luster, anemic B-movies are more commonly known as “terrible films” and you’ll very rarely find any cults dedicated to them. You need a really crazy idea, something that you just wouldn’t find in a movie with more…I dunno…taste? If you’re Troma, you might do something like zombie chickens at a fried chicken place that turn people into other zombies…or you could get really weird. Perhaps this is just me but a “good” bad film really needs to be stuffed to burstin’ with outrageously bad taste: the more offensive, the merrier. Troma, again, seems to get this right more often than not, although there’s still only so many squished heads, dead baby jokes and vomit that one person can take. Another great way to make a “good” bad film is to fill it with songs. Nothing helps a rough film go down a little easier than a few choice, hilarious, original songs. I’m probably in the minority of people who actually liked Repo! The Genetic Opera (2008) in toto but I like to think that almost anyone could have found at least a song or two to hum on their way out of the theater.

There are all kinds of ways to make a bad film “good” but there’s one common thread to all of them: despite how craptacular the film ends up being, there has to be at least one (preferably more but let’s be generous) aspect to it that is genuinely enjoyable. Otherwise, you’re just left with an amateurish, silly, disposable production, rather than the bad films that become truly legendary, like Manos: The Hands of Fate (1966) or Troll 2 (1990). When a bad film is really fun, energetic and batshit crazy, it can be the best movie-watching experience ever. When a bad movie, especially one that sets out to be quirky and batshit crazy, fails, however, we’re brought back to the sobering reality that it’s a very fine line between stupid and clever (thanks Tap!). The Moleman of Belmont Avenue (2013), despite its best intentions, is a pretty awful film…and not in the “good” way, either.

The Mugg brothers, Marion and Jarmon (co-writers/directors Mike Bradecich and John LaFlamboy), are landlords who could, most charitably, be described as slumlords. Their building has no heat or gas, very few tenants and precious little hope of new ones. This might have to with the fact that the Muggs are complete idiots, but it could also have something to do with the murderous Mole Man (Justin DiGiacomo), who has turned the remaining residents’ pets into his personal buffet line. These residents are…well…let’s just say they don’t do much to class up the joint. We have aging lothario Hezekiah Confab (Robert Englund), doddering old lady Mrs. Habershackle (Mary Seibel), a bunch of idiotic, interchangeable stoners, a reclusive hermit named Dave (David Pasquesi) and a dominatrix named Eliza (X-Zanthia). None of these are particularly interesting characters and Eliza seems to exist solely to walk around topless: were this a truly transgressive film, they would have had ol’ Mrs. Habershackle and the “girls” but this opportunity, alas, is a wasted one.

In short order, Marion and Jarmon are on the trail of the Mole Man: at first, they hope to stop it but, later, seem to be happy just to placate it. When the apartment building runs out of pets, however, the Muggs have to head out for replacements. When that doesn’t work, they decide to pick up a drifter (Police Academy’s Tim Kazurinsky) and see if the Mole Man will accept some delivery. When that doesn’t work, it’s time to suit-up, head into the basement and go mano-a-mano with the mysterious, blood-thirsty and pet-hungry monster. Better grab your super-shovels: shit’s about to get average.

It’s hard to really put a finger on what worked the least for me in Mike Bradecich and John LaFlamboy’s debut feature but right near the top of the list would definitely have to be the two writers/directors/lead actors. To put it bluntly, the two have no chemistry together whatsoever, which is pretty much items 1-5 on the attributes list for best buddies in schlock films. It’s hard to buy that these two were ever really friends, let alone actual brothers, which requires more constant suspension of disbelief than the film warrants. It’s kind of like the shields in old Star Trek episodes: the more energy expended trying to protect the ship from asteroids, the more vulnerable the ship becomes, in the long run. You waste so much energy trying to convince yourself that Bradecich and LaFlamboy “work” as a comic duo that there’s no energy left for deflecting things like the bad acting, Poverty-Row production values or staggeringly unfunny comic scenarios. For Pete’s sake, this is a film that attempts (and “attempts” should never indicate “achieves”) to posit that listening to Robert Englund make disgusting sex talk is hi-lar-eye-ous simply because he was Freddy Krueger. Poor Englund has acted in so many non-Nightmare on Elm Street-related productions in the last couple decades that I’m pretty sure most actual genre fanatics (the exact audience I would assume this is pitched at…what “normal” people would care about a goofy, ultra-low budget horror-comedy?) don’t automatically assume he’s playing Freddy whenever he’s on-screen but, hey…maybe they do and I’m the weirdo…who knows?

Another massive problem with the film is that, for a comedy, The Moleman of Belmont Avenue is startlingly unfunny. I have a pretty broad, fairly tasteless sense of humor (those aforementioned dead baby jokes? I laughed at most of ’em) but there were still only two points in the entire film that made me actually laugh out loud. The scene where Marion keeps dropping things on Jarmon, culminating in Jarmon getting hit in the crotch with a lantern, is a complete winner and the most effortlessly funny thing in the film. It’s stupid humor, to be sure, but it works great, proving that there’s no comedy stand-by quite like the old “kicked in the nuts” gag. The second genuinely funny moment comes in the scene where the Muggs go to get Mole man-fighting gear and wind up with “super shovels.” This bit was smart and pays off in another nice gag later on (so three funny moments, if you want to be technical). Other than that, the movie is a veritable wasteland of silly mugging, pratfalls, idiotic montages (filmmakers mocking the traditional “suiting-up” scenes in horror/action films have started to become as ubiquitous as those damned “bullet-time” scenes were after The Matrix blew up) and toothless attempts to be “edgy.” As far as “edgy” goes, we get a pair of truly obnoxious cops, a dominatrix neighbor who walks around topless and a gag involving a box of kittens that gets left in the trunk of a car for too long. Compared to something truly transgressive, The Moleman of Belmont Avenue is about as in-your-face as a white-bread-and-mayo sandwich with a side of sawdust.

If it means anything, the cast all seem to be having a pretty good time (or they fake it well), so Bradecich and LaFlamboy must be pretty okay guys. As such, I feel a little bad for savaging their film: after all, is it really as bad as something like The Last Rites of Ransom Pride (2010)? You know, in its own way, The Moleman of Belmont Avenue is as bad as The Last Rites of Ransom Pride. Maybe it’s not as weirdly tone-deaf as that bizarro-world “Western” but it’s just as lifeless, sloppy and brainlessly kinetic. The Moleman of Belmont Avenue reminds me of that one drunk guy who always tries to tell you a joke at a party: he’s loud, he’s sloppy, he’s belching stale beer into your face and spitting all over your eyelids whenever he talks. It takes him a good 10-15 minutes to get the joke out, mostly because he keeps forgetting elements and going back to add them. Finally, he gets to the very end…and forgets the punchline. At this point, you could wait patiently for the whole mess to play itself out again (even though you’ve already heard this knock-knock joke a hundred times) or you could just fake a laugh and vanish backwards into the crowd. If you need me, I’ll be over by the door, trying to avoid that damn drunk guy.

4/2/14: Man Behaving Very Badly

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Andy Sidaris, Antonia Dorian, auteur theory, B-movies, bad movies, Chopping Mall, cinema, Clay Westervelt, Deathstalker II, documentaries, exploitation films, Film auteurs, film reviews, filmmaking basics, films, Glori-Anne Gilbert, Jim Wynorski, Julie K. Smith, Julie Strain, Lloyd Kaufman, Louis Jourdan, misanthropic, misogyny, Monique Parent, Movies, Popatopolis, Roger Corman, scream queens, soft-core, The Bare Wench Project, The Haunting of Morella, The Witches of Breastwick, writer-director-producer

When I was a young’un, I received my cinematic education from the same sorts of places from whence this humble blog is named: the video stores (both corporate and mom-n-pop) which once used to dot this great land of ours. In those bygone days before the internet, movie blogs or Netflix, anyone interested in trashy, exploitational or out-there films had one good option: hit up your local video store and browse the stacks. How did you know if you’d found a good one? Well, in the days before identical box/poster art swept through film-land like a wildfire (standing figure, semi-profile pose, back to the camera, red and yellow color scheme, floating faces on the horizon, yadda yadda yadda), you usually knew you had someone worth watching because the box-art would make your young brain explode with possibilities.

I can’t count the number of times that I walked up and down those endless, identical rows of endless, identical little rectangular cases, picking up one after the other until I finally found an image that sent my reptilian senses soaring. Taking my treasure home, I would often be confronted with one of my first real lessons as a kid: never judge a VHS tape by its cover. Just as often, however, I would be presented with something that actually lived up to the promise of its cover. One of these early discoveries was a brilliant little film called Chopping Mall, which bears the distinction of having one of my favorite “old school” covers (as well as one of my favorite taglines): a robotic hand holds a brown-paper shopping sack full of various body-parts, while the tagline reminds us that “Shopping costs an arm and a leg.” Indeed!

 

This little gem ended up being full of all the things that a growing young boy needs: copious T & A, lots of gratuitous gore, killer robots and tons of dumb action. Who was the genius behind this inspirational little film? Why, none other than one of the undisputed masters of trash/exploitation cinema: Jim Wynorski. Over the years, I’ve seen many, many Wynorski films, some without even realizing they were his, thanks to his various pseudonyms (one of my favorites being “HR Blueberry”). I’d never seen any behind-the-scenes or documentary footage of Wynorski, however, until I viewed Clay Westervelt’s Popatopolis. This look into how Wynorski makes one of his old-fashioned exploitationers in this modern-day and age is a warts-and-all look at a filmmaker that I’ve enjoyed quite a bit over the years. The unfortunate takeaway, however? Sometimes, it’s better not to peek at the wizard behind the curtain.

Westervelt’s documentary, which takes its name from Wynorski’s frequent request of actresses that they “pop those tops,” follows the no-budget auteur as he sets out to do something he’s never done before: shoot a complete film in only three days with just a couple of crew members. The film in question is The Witches of Breastwick, however, so the deck already seems pretty stacked in his favor. Wynorski’s films since the 2000s have tended to favor porn actors/actresses over actual actors/actresses, which is a good thing since his directorial style has tended towards “point-and-shoot.” Combined with his tendency to shoot one-take of everything, Wynorski tends to put quite a bit of film in the can (metaphorically speaking), so finishing a no-budget, crappy film parody in three days doesn’t seem particularly impossible. And it’s not, as we see over the course of the film. From what we can see, however, it’s also not particularly pleasant, least of all for the poor performers stuck with Wynorksi for those three days.

The film is composed of two separate but intrinsically linked parts: talking head interviews with Wynorski peers like Andy Sidaris, Roger Corman and Lloyd Kaufman and the actual behind-the-scenes footage of the Witches of Breaswick shoot. The talking head portions are definitely the highlight of the film (at least for me) since they give an interesting perspective into where Wynorski started (as a Production Assistant for Corman) and where he’s (presumably) going. Kaufman’s bit is hilarious and way too short, but Corman’s parts are pure gold: there’s something really neat about seeing Corman sit there, the grand poobah of low-budget cinema, waxing philosophically like someone’s ultra-hip granddad. You can tell that he’s got genuine affection for Wynorski and pays him the film’s best, most sincere compliment when he says that Wynorski could do bigger and better projects if he would only take more time and care.

And that, in essence, becomes the depressing rub of the film: modern-day Wynorski just doesn’t seem to give two shits about anything. He’s been making films since the mid-’80s and many of his ’80s-’90s output are considered to be minor exploitation classics: Chopping Mall (1986), Deathstalker II (1987), Not of This Earth (1988), The Return of Swamp Thing (1989), The Haunting of Morella (1990). None of his films are what one could reasonably call “good” and none are what anyone would consider to be particularly well-crafted but, up until the 2000s, Wynorski’s movies were still essentially good ol’ fashioned B-movies. Since the 2000s, however, Wynorski seems to have found a new calling making soft-core, “Skinmax”-esque “films,” including such…product…as The Bare Wench Project (2000), Busty Cops (2004), The Witches of Breastwick (2005), The Breastford Wives (2007), The Devil Wears Nada (2009) and what one can only assume is complete truth in advertising: Busty Coeds vs Lusty Cheerleaders (2011). Whereas Wynorski used to work with the likes of Louis Jourdan, he now works almost exclusively with porn stars, the vast majority of which aren’t necessarily known for their skills as thespians. Breast size, not acting ability, are key indicators to Wynorski’s filmmaking mindset.

Once we dive into the actual shooting of The Witches of Breastwick, Wynorski is revealed to be a short-tempered, highly irritable, crude and decidedly sexist individual. His script includes the written descriptor “cow” to describe several female characters; he doesn’t say “action,” “roll camera” or any other filmmaking commands, leading to continual confusion between him and his cameraman and sound-guy; his catch-phrase appears to be “I hate it” and Wynorski makes his actors repeat their lines endlessly until they say it exactly as he wants: there’s no sense of “directing” or “coaching,” merely brute force repetition. In one of the most telling moments of the entire film, Julie K. Smith, one of Wynorski’s longtime actresses and a bit of a dramatic foil for him, says that the “Jim W” of the old days would always work extensively with his actors, pulling them aside and working them through the emotional beats of a scene. The current “Jim W” just has them repeat lines until he likes what he hears: there’s no attempt to actually get into a character, since he clearly doesn’t care about that anymore. It’s particularly illuminating to hear this from one of Wynorski’s longtime collaborators, no more so than when she states, “Good Jim is amazing…you love him. Bad Jim…I don’t use the term ‘hate’ often but…you don’t like him.”

As a look into indie filmmaking, Popatopolis is fun and quick, if more than a little depressing ala American Movie. Wynorski, however, really comes across as a repressed man-child and the rampant sexism and misogyny becomes tiring very quickly. I’ve always had a soft-spot for B-movies and exploitation cinema but there should always be basic levels of decency maintained between filmmaker and cast/crew. Too often, Wynorski comes across as a sexist bully and I just can’t get behind that, no matter how much I love Chopping Mall or Dinosaur Island. While his older films may be crude, Wynorski’s last 15 years of product has been pretty much soft-core garbage: at this point, I’m beginning to feel like the goodwill he’s earned may be used up. At the very least, the scene involving Wynorski and his elderly mother is quite charming and very cute. Mother Wynorski goes on and on about her love for Chopping Mall, with one major complaint: she hates the gratuitous nude scene, feeling it unnecessary and detrimental to the film. Maybe it’s time to start listening to your mom, Jim: after 96 films in 29 years, I’d sure love to get another Chopping Mall before you finally hang up the ol’ megaphone.

 

3/24/14: The S.S. Low Expectations

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1970's cinema, adventures, Anjelica Huston, B-movies, Beau Bridges, cinema, film reviews, films, Genevieve Bujold, Geoffrey Holder, Jamaica, James Earl Jones, James Goldstone, Movies, odd movies, Peter Boyle, pirates, Robert Shaw, silly films, slapstick, Swashbuckler

Most of the time, even if I can’t quite understand a film, I can at least get myself into the mindset of seeing where the filmmakers are coming from. This can apply to things as complex and fairly inscrutable as Primer, Upstream Colour or Sauna, as well as films that are relatively brainless but hopelessly complicated, such as The Last Rites of Ransom Pride, The Box or Stardust. In most cases, the filmmakers’ intents are relatively clear, even if their final product is hopelessly muddled or head-scratchingly confusing. Every great once in a while, however, I’m faced with a film that completely baffles me, not necessarily because I can’t follow the plot but because I have absolutely no idea what the filmmakers actually intended to do. These films, rare as they are, can either function as delicious treats or obnoxious puzzles, depending on how much collective good will the films manage to accrue across their running times. In the case of Swashbuckler, featuring the intriguing pairing of Robert Shaw and James Earl Jones, I found myself with but one coherent thought after the final credits rolled: what the hell did I just watch?

The film begins with pirate captain Ned Lynch (Robert Shaw) and the merry crew of the Blarney Cock showing up to shell a coastal fort, disrupting the planned hanging of fellow pirate Nick Debrett (James Earl Jones). Ned and Nick are old friends, of course, and what would any good adventure be without a good wingman? In no time, the pair are sailing the high seas, disrupting the dastardly activities of crooked governor Lord Durant (Peter Boyle) and earning the admiration of comely lass Jane (Genevieve Bujold). You see, Lord Durant is attempting to take over Jamaica, placing the islands under his iron-fisted, weirdly sadomasochistic control, and there are only three things that stand in his way: Ned, Nick and Jane. Hold onto your tri-cornered hats, ladies and gents: it’s gonna be an awfully bumpy ride!

Unlike other genuinely strange films, Swashbuckler actually has a pretty easily digestible plot-line: it’s just your basic pirates against the government tale, after all. Shaw and Jones are fantastic as Ned and Nick, possessing an easy rapport that marks the two as old, fast friends. Truth be told, Shaw and Jones are so good and so natural that Swashbuckler is never a difficult or unpleasant film to watch: it just never makes a whole lot of sense, that’s all. Bujold is good as the stereotypical noblewoman/firebrand but her part is pretty cookie-cutter for this type of film. The pirate crew, which includes familiar genre faves like Sid Haig and Geoffrey Holder, make a great team and many of the sword-fighting, swashbuckling scenes are quite rousing. That being said, however, the film still manages to stuff ten pounds of weird into a five-pound sack.

Without a doubt, one of the strangest, most jaw-dropping aspects of the film has to be Peter Boyle’s genuinely bizarre performance as Lord Durant. Boyle plays Durant like some sort of space alien martinet: his performance includes back-waxing scenes, bathtub romps, multiple yelling fits and more psuedo-sadomasochistic affectations than you can shake a switch at. The giddy apex of insanity has to be the part where Durant punishes his loyal second-in-command Major Folly (Beau Bridges) by having him remove his shirt while Durant’s weird assistant menaces his bare chest with a device that seems to be Freddy Krueger’s razor-glove re-imagined with spoons. Honestly. I couldn’t make this up if I tried, ladies and gents. Even better, the creepy assistant reappears during the climatic final battle, where he attempts to fight swordsmen with his spoon-glove hand-thing. The best way to sum this up, quite frankly, would be with a question of sorts: what the fuck?

We also get wonderful moments like the bit where Beau Bridges overacts so much that he actually cracks up his co-actors (no mean feat when everyone is chewing scenery by the yard), Anjelica Huston playing a mysterious, mute woman who goes by the name Lady of Dark Visage in the credits and Genevieve Bujold’s skinny-dipping for no apparent reason (although good ol’ Robert Shaw seems to get a couple of eyefuls. Shaw makes his grand entrance in the film wearing a skin-tight, bright-red jumpsuit that’s more Studio 54 than Blackbeard and the vast majority of the cast (main and supporting) spend the entire film with giant, goody grins plastered on their faces. Was everyone high on set? At the very least, I’m willing to wager that someone made use of a pretty decent-sized tank of nitrous: the looks on the various actors’ faces are positively beatific! Special mention must also be made of Geoffrey Holder’s Cudjo. Between his super-sized appearance and patented, booming laugh, Holder is a complete delight and the sequence where his acrobats help them infiltrate Durant’s compound reminds me of nothing so much as the various circus action scenes in Octopussy.

Ultimately, the main source of my confusion (Peter Boyle weirdness notwithstanding, of course) is the mixed tone of the film. At times, the film seems to be a fairly straight-forward, if rather silly, pirate adventure: nothing too strange there. At other times, however, the film mixes more straightforward, Goonies-esque action, comedy with straight-up, breaking-the-fourth-wall satire. There’s the aforementioned Beau Bridges performance (those other actors are definitely cracking up: I rewound and watched it just to make sure), as well as the scene where he attempts to fight off Ned and Nick in a low-roofed carriage, only to have his sword continually hit the ceiling whenever he draws it from his scabbard. More telling, however, is the climatic moment where Lord Durant meets his fate (no spoilers here, folks: if you didn’t see that one coming from the first frame, you weren’t paying particularly good attention. Boyle overacts like a champion, clutching his breast and lurching about as if performing a dinner theater version of Hamlet’s climax. The scene seems to go on forever, Boyle shamelessly mugging as if his melodramatic eye-rolling might stave off death, itself. Finally, he tumbles through a window, uttering the immortal final line: “Pull the curtain: the farce is ending!” Normally, I might assume this was just some attempt at a “badass” last line. As it stands, however, I find myself wondering if the filmmakers weren’t actually making some sort of comment on the film, as a whole. Was this supposed to be a farce all along? Had I actually missed something (or several somethings) along the way? Perhaps…but I’m not rewatching to find out!

At the end of the day, Swashbuckler is many, many things (including a tremendous mess) but it’s never boring. Most of the time, in fact, the film is great, goofy fun. Everyone involved, especially Shaw, seems to be having a blast and no one seems to be phoning in their performances. If anything, so much scenery is chewed that the poverty-row production values (the transfer is simply awful and the whole film has all of the visual panache of a dreary made-for-TV film) tend to fade into the background…at least somewhat. In this “glory day” of the “so-bad-it’s-good” film, where intentionally terrible movies are routinely churned out with a wink and a nod, it’s somewhat refreshing to see an honest-to-god B-movie that’s just what it advertises: a silly, goofy, fun time. I doubt if this film will ever hit anybody’s “Best of…” lists but I doubt if that’s why it was made in the first place. For my money? Swashbuckler ain’t a classic but it beats getting tortured with a spoon-glove any day of the week.

 

2/17/14: These are Mean Times

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action films, Assault on Precinct 13, Austin Stoker, auteur theory, B-movies, child killing, cinema, classic movies, claustrophic, Darwin Joston, Douglas Knapp, favorite films, Film auteurs, film reviews, films, gang members, Halloween, iconic film scores, John Carpenter, Lalo Schifrin, low-budget films, Movies, Napoleon Wilson, police station, score, siege, synth scores, working together

Anyone who knows me well knows that pinning me down on my favorite anything can be an exercise in frustration: my specific lists of favorite films, music, TV shows, food, etc…tend to change not so much on a regular basis but on a moment-to-moment basis. Stick around long enough and, chances are, you’ll hear me call at least two separate things “the greatest ______ ever,” if not five separate things. This isn’t to say that I’m necessarily fickle with my entertainment loves: rather, I try to constantly expose myself to new films, music, etc, which often has the effect of displacing some of my previous loves.

That being said, however, there are still a few films that never quite leave the “Best of…” list, even if their ultimate position in said list tends to be constantly changing. The Good, The Bad and the Ugly is one of those films, as is The Godfather and The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Goodfellas and Taxi Driver are both on there, of course, because I can’t have a  favorites list without some Scorcese. It goes without saying that John Carpenter’s seminal Halloween is on the list but there’s another Carpenter film that, for me, is even more of a no-brainer for inclusion. This is a film so perfect that I ceased looking for flaws at least a decade ago and have simply accepted its place in the ultimate list of my life: somewhere right around the top, maybe bumping shoulders with Faith No More, Travis Bickle and Leatherface. It’s a movie that, if I’m being honest with myself, I actually like more than Halloween. The film? Assault on Precinct 13. Why do I love it so much? Let me count the ways.

Carpenter’s Assault on Precinct 13 is one of those cases where the individual parts of a movie, while mighty on their own, come together to form something akin to the Voltron of exploitation cinema. We start with Carpenter’s iconic synth score, including that mammoth theme song. For me, this provokes a near Pavlovian response, similar to the one I get from Morricone’s essential score for The Good, The Bad and The Ugly: every time I hear that series of terse, clipped notes, followed by that simmering synth stab, I get a little adrenaline rush, a little tickle in the back of my reptile brain. This is the “ass-kicking” cortex getting stimulated and the Assault on Precinct 13 theme is its cellphone ringer. Pair this theme with the stark red letters on black screen opening credits and the film seems classic before it even properly begins.

Carpenter’s score is a whole lot more than just that jagged, robotic call-to-arms, however. There’s a moody piece in the score that plays during Bishop’s arrival at Precinct 13 (as well as the aftermath of the “shoot-in”) that ranks as one of my favorite pieces of film music ever, including such luminous peers as the sweeping Godfather score and Morricone’s aforementioned Good, Bad, Ugly score. It’s a melancholy, nearly bluesy bit that reminds me of Lalo Schifrin’s score for Dirty Harry (another of my all-time favorite film/score combos) and is so perfectly evocative that it almost tells a story on its own. It’s a pensive piece that neatly serves as a theme for Bishop’s thoughtful, quiet leadership style.

The score, by turns ominous and melancholy, perfectly underscores the film’s themes and walks hand-in-hand with the stark, gritty visuals. Shot by Carpenter’s Dark Star cinematographer Douglas Knapp (on what would end up being his last feature film work, to date), Assault on Precinct 13 has a washed-out, sun-bleached look that recalls Dirty Harry, yet manages to incorporate the deep-focus elements that would become so familiar when Halloween rampaged across movie screens two years later. As in Halloween, there’s a lot in Assault on Precinct 13 that occurs on the edges of the frame: figures skulking about, the sudden appearance (or disappearance) of a character. The tight framing handily evokes a constant, sustained feeling of claustrophobia throughout the film, while the washed-out color palette gives everything a subtly doomed feel.

As with everything else in the film, Assault on Precinct 13th’s plot is lean, mean and fat-free: on the eve that a small, isolated police station in one of the worst parts of the city is about to be shuttered, a tiny skeleton crew of officers and prisoners must make a desperate stand against a seemingly endless army of blood-thirsty, armed-to-the-teeth gang members. With no hope of rescue or reinforcements until the wee hours of the morning, Lt. Bishop (Austin Stoker), Leigh (Laurie Zimmer) and notorious convict Napoleon Wilson (Darwin Joston) must use their wits, resolve and whatever weapons they can scrounge together to keep from becoming more casualties of the mean streets.

And that’s it, folks: no meandering B and C stories…no unnecessary romantic subplots…no drifting off into tangents that dilute the overall impact…just 90 minutes of pure survival. This isn’t to say that there isn’t any character development or that everyone is flat: far from it. Rather, Carpenter has written an excellent, tight script that allows characters to develop organically, rather than exist merely as convenient genre stereotypes. Bishop and Wilson, on their own, are two of the most fascinating genre creations to ever grace the silver screen: neither one comes across as clichéd and I’ve always found myself wondering what happened to the characters after the film ended. Hell, I often find myself wondering what happened to the characters before the movie started and I’m a guy that pretty much abhors prequels. In this case, however, I’ve always been dying to know what Napoleon did that was so terrible and what happened to Lt. Bishop as a young man. It’s a testament to Carpenter’s writing that he’s left me wanting more, just like a good book.

All of these elements add up to a lot but they wouldn’t add up to a righteously kick-ass action film without some righteously kick-ass action sequences, now would they? Fear not, friends and neighbors: Assault on Precinct 13th has this covered. From the Western-esque scene where about one million gang members shoot approximately 4 billion bullets into the station house to the edge-of-the-seat finale where Bishop and Wilson hold off a snarling, feral mob in a narrow corridor from behind the world’s tiniest barricade, Assault on Precinct 13 very rarely comes up for air. In fact, the film is so tense that the pressure kicks on in the first frames (thanks to that epic theme) and is ratcheted up before we even get to the police station: by that point, the film is ready to explode…and does.

The acting, like everything else in Assault on Precinct 13, is impeccable. Although the cast is filled with unfamiliar faces and lacks the recognizable appeal of a Donald Pleasence, they work together quite beautifully. In particular, special recognition must be given to the two leads: Austin Stoker and Darwin Joston.

Stoker brings a real sense of quiet dignity and resolve to Lt. Bishop, qualities that almost bring him more in line with traditional Western heroes than with law enforcement ones. Joston, on the other hand, plays Napoleon Wilson with just the right amount of Southern charm, self-deprecation and quiet menace. Stoker and Joston have real chemistry together and I’ve always wished that the two could have gone on to do other “buddy”-type films. Missed opportunities notwithstanding, the friendship between the black police officer and the white, Southern convict brings some emotional heft to the story and makes the ending genuinely powerful: as Bishop and Wilson stand in the debris, a “rescuing” officer attempts to grab the prisoner, only to be violently shoved away by Lt. Bishop. After staring down the over-eager officer, Bishop walks Wilson out with the dignity and respect that he’s earned over the course of the siege. It’s a big, powerful moment and it never fails to get me in the gut every time: follow that with a quick cut back to the red text/black background with the theme playing and I stand and salute every single damn time.

At the end of the day, I have a lot of concrete reasons for loving Assault on Precinct 13: the acting is fantastic, the cinematography is moody and claustrophobic, the script is smart, the dialogue cracks, the relationship between Bishop and Wilson feels completely genuine and the score is absolutely superb. For me, these all seem like ingredients in a sure-fire formula for a perfect film. More than anything, however, there’s a feeling I get from watching this film that’s hard to quite explain. I’ll never stop watching Halloween or The Thing but there’s just something about Assault on Precinct 13 that really gets to me on a primal level. Perhaps it’s because we live in such a hard world and it seems like the streets of the Anderson Precinct could become a reality at any time. Perhaps it’s because the film so gloriously upholds that most human and beautiful of beliefs: as long as you can breathe, you can keep fighting.

2/10/14: The Dude Slums It

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'80s action films, 8 Million Ways to Die, Andy Garcia, Angel Moldonado, auteur theory, B-movies, bad films, bad movies, based on a book, Being There, cinema, David Lee Henry, Film auteurs, film reviews, films, Hal Ashby, Harold and Maude, Jeff Bridges, Jesus Quintana, Matt Scudder, Movies, Oliver Stone, Randy Brooks, Rosanna Arquette, The Big Lebowski, To Live and Die in L.A., William Friedkin, Z-movies

Sometimes, it’s easy to figure out why a film turns out bad. It can feature a hack director (Uwe, despite your vicious left hook, I’m looking right at you), an obnoxious “star” (anything with Tom Green) or a terrible script (take your pick): it might even feature all of those, like some form of noxious cinematic goulash. Sometimes, however, it can be a little more difficult to peg why a film turns out less successfully than intended or even (worst case scenario) why said film fails completely. A film can seem to have everything going for it or, at the very least, enough to at least be an enjoyable romp, yet still wildly miss the mark and flail around like an octopus in tap-shoes. Such is the case with 8 Million Ways to Die, an empty-headed ’80s actioner starring Jeff “The Dude” Bridges and directed by Hal Asby (Harold and Maude, Shampoo, Being There). You’d think that their combined pedigrees would amount to something at least marginally entertaining: you would be quite wrong, indeed.

Plot-wise, 8 Million Ways to Die resembles quite a few other action films, both from the ’80s and beyond. Matt Scudder (Bridges) is a former alcoholic/ex-cop who gets approached by a mysterious woman (Alexandra Paul) at an AA meeting. It turns out that she’s a hooker and wants Matt’s help in leaving her pimp, Chance (Randy Brooks). Since nothing is ever as easy as it first seems, poor Matt is soon involved with a kooky drug-dealer named Angel (a very young Andy Garcia in one of his first feature films) and his “girlfriend” Sarah (Rosanna Arquette). Along the way, Matt must avenge Sunny’s death (for some reason), bring her killers to justice and woo Sarah before they’re all killed by the completely unbalanced Angel.

In many ways, 8 Million Ways to Die resembles a brain-dead re-do of William Friedkin’s far-superior To Live and Die in L.A., a film which came out a mere six months prior. The film is filled with all of the studied cool, washed-out pastels, garish neon and cheesy synths of Friedkin’s film but everything seems to fall flat in 8 Million Ways to Die. Even Bridges, always one of the most reliably interesting actors in the business, seems both bored and bemused by the chaos around him.

Bridges is reliably good, if tuned-out, but he’s completely surrounded by a crowd of actors going for broke in ways that seem to indicate there was some sort of over-acting competition going on behind-the-scenes. Obvious winner? Andy Garcia as the absolutely ludicrous Angel Moldonado. He chews up so much scenery that I’m surprised he didn’t gain 100 pounds on-set. With his ridiculously tiny, greasy ponytail, childishly foul mouth and blinding white suits, Angel seems to be the spiritual forefather for John Turturro’s Jesus Quintana in The Big Lebowski. Imagine “the Jesus” as a James Bond villain and you have some idea of the sheer stupidity on display here. Toss in a performance by Arquette that could best be described as “probably high” and a jaw-clenching shoutathon from Randy Brooks as Chance, the nicest pimp on the silver screen and the whole things seems like a particularly bad dinner-theater production that Bridges somehow stumbled into.

Thus far, we have a few potentially toxic ingredients in this little stew: over-the-top, unlikable acting; a stereotypically cheesy score; absolutely dated mise en scene; a Scooby Doo level of mystery-solving that involves finding the cat ring that matches a pair of cat earrings. Where the film really begins to distinguish itself, however, is with its abysmally terrible script. Not only is the film needlessly confusing (I found myself needing to draw a chart of the various characters’ relationships until I realized that this was more work than the filmmakers point into their project and I tore it up in disgust) but the sense of cause-and-effect is broken, to say the least. Characters act in whatever manner seems handy to the story, at the moment, with no regards to how anything actually fits together. There was so much random activity going on that it seemed both silly and insulting to even attempt to tie it into a traditional “private eye” framework: with a story this nonsensical, what’s there to investigate and solve?

With a bad script, of course, comes some bad dialogue and 8 Million Ways to Die gives us some real howlers. Bridges explains the film’s title and needlessly ties the movie into The Naked City when he states that, “In this city, there are eight million ways to die.” Awesome. Sunny hits on Matt by telling him that “The street light makes my pussy hair glow in the dark,” a line which she delivers in precisely the same manner as one might give directions to a stranger on the street. The big “climax” of the film involves a stand-off between Angel and his gang, Matt and Chance and predominantly involves the cast yelling, “Fuck you!” “No, fuck you!” for the better part of 10 minutes. Ironically, this actually counts as some of the best, canniest writing in the entire film. You haven’t lived until you’ve seen Jeff Bridges and Andy Garcia yell “Fuck you” at each other like they were cycling through emotions in an actors’ workshop. Now show me confusion…good! Show me boredom…excellent! Now pretend that you’re hungry…fantastic!

As I mentioned earlier, 8 Million Ways to Die seems to be a pretty curious failure. There’s a great director (Ashby’s Being There and Harold and Maude are cinematic staples) and a good cast: what went wrong? In this case, if I may pop on my deerstalker and play detective, I thing I might know where to lay at least a little of the blame. When one examines the credits, one notices that 8 Million Ways to Die is adapted from the book of the same name by a couple of screenwriters: Oliver Stone and David Lee Henry. Stone should be familiar to just about anyone but David Lee Henry is actually the more illuminating of the two: Henry, you see, is also the genius scribe behind Charles Bronson’s The Evil That Men Do (easily one of Chuck’s worst, meanest films), Patrick Swayze’s Road House and Steven Seagal’s Out For Justice.

And there you have it, ladies and gentlemen: the auteur behind Harold and Maude and Being There, two of the wittiest, liveliest comedies ever made, once directed a dumb ’80s action film starring Jeff Bridges and written by the lunkhead who brought us Out For Justice. Was there ever any way this thing could have been a contender?