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Movies

Agency (1980) a (ridiculously) belated review

So I was wandering around Costco the other day and, in looking over the depressingly smaller and smaller DVD/BluRay section, I find this…

100 “Awesomely” Cheesy Movies?  I turn the box around and take a closer look at its contents.  I’m somewhat leery -yet fascinated by- these mega movie collections.  True, the quality of the films presented tend to be…less…both in terms of the movie’s actual transfer and, for the most part, the movies themselves.

Still, I give those contents a look and, at $15.99 for the collection, figured even if I did buy it without recognizing any of the films, I was bound to find something interesting.  As it turned out, I recognized several of the films in this grouping, which included for the most part forgotten films from the 1970’s and 80’s.

Foremost on the list was Agency, a 1980 film featuring one of my favorite actors of all time (and in the “bad guy” role, natch!), Robert Mitchum.  Even more curious, the film starred the Six Million Dollar Man himself, Lee Majors!  (A bit of trivia: Lee Majors and Robert Mitchum would appear in the 1988 Bill Murray film Scrooged, though they did not share any screen time together.  Lee Major’s cameo appearance is a hoot and I present it below, though the sound quality of the clip is quite bad).

I bought the collection, headed home, put the disc featuring Agency into my DVD player and…nothing.  The screen was a blank.  I ejected the DVD and tried again.  Same result.  A third time.  Nothing.

I tried another, different disc from the collection, worried that perhaps the entire collection was unplayable on my DVD system.  It played fine.  And by fine I mean the movie(s) played.  The images were grainy as hell and the sound was borderline abysmal, but I’ve endured worse.

Anyway, I took the Agency DVD to another player in another part of my house and gave it a try there.  For whatever reason, it worked there.

Whew.

Considering I bought this set mainly to see this one film, it would have been a shame that this one particular disc would prove defective!

Anyway, the film starts and, yes, the images remain consistent with what I saw on the other disk, that is to say pretty poor and the sound isn’t all that great.  Yet it was good enough to watch the film, even if it appears that at least in the first half a censor erased the swear words.  Curiously, in the later half of the film we hear Mr. Majors utter a few choice PG lines…perhaps the censor fell asleep after the first half of the film!?

Agency is a curious bird of a film, a thriller whose makers appeared squeamish about giving us too many thrills and a plot that, let’s face it, anyone in the audience would have figured out far ahead of the protagonist.

Lee Majors is Philip Morgan, a creative director at an advertising agency.  He has a girlfriend, Brenda Wilcox (played by the lovely Valerie Perrine, who for the most part is wasted in her role) and a neurotic co-worker and Jewish friend named Sam Goldstein (Saul Rubinek in one of his very early roles…weird to see him so young when you’re accustomed to seeing him in Warehouse 13!).

A new boss, Ted Quinn (Robert Mitchum, natch) has bought out the agency and strange things are afoot.  Goldstein tells his friend Morgan that many employees, many more than should, are quitting the agency.  This doesn’t bother Morgan as much as being told by Goldstein that Quinn has started a “secret” project without informing him.  Given that Morgan is the head of the creative division of this agency, it is understandable he feels like he’s being eased out of his job.

After meeting with Quinn, however, the new owner allays Morgan’s fears by being seemingly very upfront and telling him the only reason Morgan wasn’t given a head’s up is because the project just came into the agency and the company behind them wants to keep it hush-hush.  Morgan is gracefully allowed to oversee this no longer secret -to him anyway- project and all appears well…

…until Morgan is asked to take an overnight trip with Quinn for another company and Goldstein tries to dissuade him from going, telling him he’s “figured it out”.

I know, I know.  Scintillating stuff, right?

When Morgan returns from his trip, he can’t reach him friend and, after breaking into his apartment, finds Goldstein dead in the refrigerator.  It was at this point one would have thought the tension would increase.

One would be wrong.

As I mentioned before, the makers of the film seemed to be squeamish with the whole “tension” idea and when Morgan is subsequently in grave mortal danger viewers are given reason to think things aren’t quite as dangerous as they appear.  For instance, the two thugs meant to either kill him or his girl wind up appearing clownish at times.  Further, Lee Majors has a curiously mellow way of dealing with the danger presented, often lighten tension with farcical statements.  So, instead of ratcheting up the suspense as the movie hurls to its climax ala, say, The Parallax View or Seven Days in May or All The President’s Men (political thrillers all), the film’s climax gets watered down considerably.  Worse, Robert Mitchum, the main reason I wanted to see the film, is given very little in the end to do here.  His big reveal is interesting (if obvious) yet he never comes across as the heavy I expected, at least compared to his wonderful dark turn in the original 1962 version of Cape Fear.

In the end, I can’t recommend Agency to anyone other than a person like me, one who enjoys seeing obscure Robert Mitchum or Lee Majors films.  There is a reason, after all, this film is as obscure as it is…

If you remain curious to see the film, here it is in its entirety, courtesy of YouTube.  The copy presented there looks suspiciously like the one I saw!

Movies

Pacific Rim (2013) a (mildly) belated review

When i was a kid, our family moved to and lived in South America for a number of years.  There, the primary source of “kid’s” entertainment on television were a wide variety of Japanese TV shows.  Whether cartoon or live action, the predominate “boy” shows featured a wide assortment of robots battling other robots and heroes who piloted said vehicles.

By the time we left South America I was burned out by the whole thing.  I was surprised to find that when I arrived in the United States, the whole Japanese manga movement was only just beginning, so what was old hat to me was something new and fascinating to American audiences.

Years passed and today, the Japanese sci-fi market in all its various incarnations is pretty well known and, of course, extends well beyond the giant fighting robot genre.

Still, that’s the particular genre I’ve most remembered from my youth.  I believe the first Americanized version of this particular genre could be found in the low budget 1989 release Robot Jox.

Watching that trailer above, its interesting to see how as much as things change, they manage to stay the same.

Pacific Rim, director/co-writer Guillermo Del Toro’s love letter to this genre, is a perfectly good action/adventure film featuring giant robots and the monsters they fight.  The plot is very simple: A strange undersea rift has appeared and is spitting out giant sized monsters that, natch, attack the coastal cities of Earth.  Humanity unites to fight the menace and ultimately creates a squad of giant robots piloted by two people who are mentally “linked” together to do the job.  But the menace grows greater as stronger and more fearsome monsters appear, and a mystery develops regarding their origins…and purpose.

I had a perfectly good time watching Pacific Rim.  No, the film won’t earn awards for Shakespearean levels of acting or for the screenplay’s subtlety or depth.

This is nothing more and nothing less than a fun popcorn film.

Strangely, the film nonetheless managed to divide audiences quite a bit.  A friend of mine stated he tried to see the film a couple of times but could not get past the first twenty minutes.  Others have pointed a plot holes they felt critically wounded the movie’s story.

I dunno.

We are talking about a world where giant robots sucker punching giant monsters are a more effective way of dealing with said menaces versus nerve gas or missiles or nukes or any other form of projectiles.

In other words, if you’re willing to sit back and let the movie flow, I suspect you’ll have a good time.

For those looking for something more “logical”, then perhaps you should stick with action movies that have that…say, Skyfall or The Avengers?

Recommended.

Movies

The Grand Budapest Hotel (2014) a (right on time!) review

…well, right on time plus a couple of weeks…

Way, waaaay back in 1990 I went to the theaters to see Reversal of Fortune.  The movie, starring Jeremy Irons and Glenn Close, examined the real life attempts by lawyer Alan Dershowitz and his students to overturn the murder conviction of Klaus van Bulou, who had been convicted of attempting to murder his wife Sunny, a very wealthy New York socialite.

The film was great and Jeremy Irons delivered a creepy turn as van Bulou.  Further, it featured a terrific courtroom drama, something I normally find very intriguing.  And yet, immediately after seeing the film I knew I would probably never see it again and therefore not buy it when it reached the home video market.

In those younger, more naive times I lived in, I found these divergent feelings very odd.  How could I, on the one hand, enjoy a film as much as this one yet, on the other hand, know that as good as it was, there was little chance I would ever revisit it?

Which brings us to The Grand Budapest Hotel.  Directed and co-written by cult favorite Wes Anderson, the film is a whimsical comedy/mystery/action film regarding M. Gustave (Ralph Fiennes, absolutely fantastic in the lead comedic role), an outwardly elegant and well spoken (but inwardly somewhat sleazy and foul mouthed) concierge at the aforementioned Hotel and Zero Moustafa, a lobby boy he takes under his wing.  The movie takes place at the outset of World War II, but deliberately blurs reality of these times to make the movie more of a live action cartoon, with at times very dreamy set pieces and characters.

In many ways the film resembles a live action version of the Tintin graphic novels of Herge (not the film version by Steven Spielberg, which while entertaining enough, never grasped the “spirit” of the works nor Herge’s love of culture).

I laughed long and hard at many of the jokes presented, particularly the running gag of M. Gustave’s oh-so-proper diction, which at the turn of a hat becomes foul mouthed cursing.  The romance between Zero Moustafa and Agatha (Saoirse Ronan) was also well handled and bittersweet, as well as the story, involving the possible murder of a wealthy socialite (shades of Reversal of Fortune!) and the coming war.

The movie also features a wealth of cameo appearances by familiar actors, from Harvey Keitel to Bill Murray to Tilda Swinton, etc. etc.  That, unfortunately, winds up being one of the film’s weaker links as these cameos, amusing as they were, often didn’t pay off quite as well as the filmmakers probably hoped.  While it was interesting to spot the various actors here and there, they are often no more than window dressing and some are given very little to do (Bill Murray’s few scenes, in particular, felt pointless).

Despite this, the film is a worthy watch, a more than solid effort that entertained me during its run.  Now, I have enjoyed some of Wes Anderson’s films, but not all of them.  I think he is a unique creator, a man whose works clearly stand out from others.  The Grand Budapest Hotel is one of his better overall efforts, in my opinion, yet I would caution those who are not fans of Mr. Anderson’s particular style to tread lightly.  For those who are fans, The Grand Budapest Hotel is a no-brainer, another elegant, well thought out piece of whimsy.

Yet as good as the film is, I can help but return to my opening comments.  The Grand Budapest Hotel, to me is very much like Reversal of Fortune in the sense that as much as I enjoyed it, I doubt I’ll revisit the film anytime soon (if at all).  Make of that what you will.

Still, and also like Reversal of Fortune, I heartily recommend giving the film a look.  Though it ultimately may not be my cup of tea to revisit, it most certainly was worth at least one visit.

Movies

Captain America: The Winter Soldier (2014) a (right on time) review

By now, a mere week or so since Captain America: The Winter Soldier (CATWS from now on) was released, it has proven a mighty box-office hit and, for the most part, people really like, if not outright love, the film.

Count me in the previous category.

I very much enjoyed CATWS and have no hesitation in recommending it to anyone who hasn’t seen it yet.  The movie is a first rate production featuring, among other things, suspense, action, humor, and terrific special effects.  But it this added bonus makes it even more special:  The very clever casting of Robert Redford in a role that screams references to some of his previous films (most notably All The President’s Men and Three Days of the Condor) while simultaneously -and deviously- subverting fans of those older film’s expectations.  I’ll say no more…

…for now.

So, in brief: See the movie.  Unless you have no pulse, you should find it very enjoyable.  It is not perfect, but it is a solid, and easily one of the better, Marvel Universe films released to date.

SPOILERY REVIEW FOLLOWS!!!!

 

YOU’VE BEEN WARNED!!!!

 

Allow me to elaborate on the whole “it is not perfect” thing I mentioned above.

Yes, CATWS is a solid, very entertaining film.  It is also, unfortunately, a little bit like the latest James Bond film Skyfall (my review of it can be found here): A first rate production and an exciting film with a rather…how do I put it kindly?…troubled story.

Now, I don’t think CATWS’ story was quite as flawed as Skyfall’s.  Yet it does have its problems.  For example, the whole opening bit involving a ship taken over by pirates wound up being something else.

But what exactly?

There was a VERY IMPORTANT computer program -and personnel- on board the ship which figured into the rest of the story, but why in the world was this program there?  There is no explanation given, which makes you wonder all the more why it was there in the first place.  Later in the film we’re told that maybe Sgt. Fury -the man who sends in Captain America and his group to “rescue” the ship- actually had something to do with the piracy in the first place.

But…did he?

As a viewer I was never certain because it is the villain who states Fury was responsible for the piracy itself.  However, him being the villain, do we believe his words?  Was Fury just “lucky” the ship was assaulted and he then got his hands on this highly important material?

As should be evident, even as I write this I have no idea who was behind this opening piracy.

Which leads us to the next, most difficult aspect of the movie to swallow: That the SHIELD organization, Fury’s organization, was infiltrated many years before and is run by operatives of HYDRA, Marvel’s answer to James Bond’s S.P.E.C.T.E.R.

Because the movie rolls along so nicely, I was willing to let that one pass, but when you think about it, this idea is a really hard one to accept.  It would be akin to having the Nazi’s “secretly” infiltrate the U.S. Army during the waning days of WWII and “lay low” all this time while essentially doing their evil undercover.  If these evil people were so deeply infiltrated within SHIELD, why did they let the piracy thing happen?  If such an important program to them was on that ship, why let Captain America go there and rescue the passengers?

Evil organizations shouldn’t care too much about losing one or two people.  Couldn’t they have “accidentally” destroyed the ship and everyone on board and ended the possibility of their master plan being exposed once and for all?

Now, moving to the meat and potatoes of the film, actor Chris Evans is decent in the role of Captain America but little more.  While I’ve enjoyed him in other roles, as Captain America he’s rather bland and hard to relate to.  I’m sure others may disagree.  Scarlett Johansson and Samuel L. Jackson fare better in their roles of the Black Widow and Sgt. Fury, respectively, and Anthony Mackie is fine in the role of the Falcon.

But its Robert Redford that really grabbed my attention.  I’ll be honest, when all was said and done his role was a cliche (He essentially played Cliff Robertson’s role from Three Days of the Condor).  Yet it was stunning to see the veteran actor in a “superhero” movie.  Even more intriguing is to play the “what if” game.  In his youth, I think Mr. Redford would have made a terrific Captain America.  He certainly has the right look for it!

Ah, what could have been.

In the end, I return to what I said before:  CATWS is worth your time.  I said above that it was one of the “better” Marvel Universe films I’ve seen.  Thinking about some of the others, I may have to revise my opinion.  It may be the best of the lot, at least so far, even with the flaws mentioned above.

Go see it.  You’ll enjoy it.

Movies

Invasion U.S.A. (1985) a (very) belated review

The late 1970’s and into the early to middle 1980’s were arguably Chuck Norris’ theatrical heyday.  Rising from small roles in karate movies to become the star of such “B” films as Good Guys Wear Black (1978), The Octagon (1980), Lone Wolf McQuade (1983, a personal favorite, which pitted Mr. Norris against Mr. Kung Fu himself, David Carradine, and obviously served as an inspiration to his later TV series Walker, Texas Ranger), and Missing In Action I and II (1984 and 1985, respectively), Mr. Norris was arguably on a roll.

In 1985 and in conjunction with the also rising Cannon Films Group, Mr. Norris took on the title role of “Matt Hunter” in Invasion U.S.A., a film whose trailer promised it to be one of the biggest Chuck Norris action films yet…

Now, lets be real clear: Invasion U.S.A. was probably green lit because of the previous year’s Red Dawn, a film that featured a similar concept in the invasion of the United States by hostile forces and the people who fight them off (Red Dawn would be remade in 2012 with far less “success”, if you consider the first one that!).

The difference between Red Dawn and Invasion U.S.A. was in the star(s), the people behind the cameras, and the budget.  Red Dawn featured a group of young, up and coming actors (including Patrick Swayze, Charlie Sheen, Lea Thompson, Jennifer Grey, etc. etc.), and was directed and co-written by the legendary John Milius (among his credits, the “Indianapolis” dialogue in Jaws, the script for the second Dirty Harry film, Magnum Force, the original Conan film, etc.).

Invasion U.S.A., on the other hand, had an obviously far lower budget and a cast of mostly unknowns (though actor Richard Lynch made a pretty good career for himself playing bad guys during that time).  In the end, all the film really had going for it was Chuck Norris.

But I will give the movie makers this: They were trying to make a “bigger” picture than their obviously low budget allowed them to.

The plot of Invasion U.S.A. is summed up in its name: At the tail end of the Cold War, a devious renegade (?) Russian terrorist named Mikhail Rostov gathers a group of terrorist malcontents and, under cover of darkness, lands and disperses them from South Florida to the rest of the United States, where they begin a series of terrorist acts whose goal is to destabilize and subvert the country.

Before reaching that point, the movie presents a relatively linear story.  We see some Cuban refugees in a boat trying to make it to Florida.  A Coast Guard vessel appears and the captain (Richard Lynch’s Rostov) pretends he’ll bring them in only to open fire and kill everyone on board.  Turns out the boat has a large cargo of cocaine within its hold, drugs which Rostov then uses to buy himself a bunch of weapons which he then gives his group of terrorists and off they go into the U.S.A.

Unfortunately, after those opening minutes of the film, the “story” makes way for a series of scenes showing the terrorists doing something bad and good ol’ Chuck Norris appearing and blasting their heathen commie asses away before they can do their evil.

How does Chuck Norris know where they are or what they’re up to?  Never explained.  The terrorists are about to do their stuff and he just shows up, fires a bunch of bullets, and kills kills kills.  No real logic nor storytelling by this point, just action sequences.

When enough of these showcase scenes are presented, we return (somewhat) to the “story” and see a sad Chuck Norris standing before a carnival ride that has gone up in flames.  Chuck laments the fact that for every terrorist action he stops, a “thousand” more succeed.  He tells his CIA handler that its time to do something to end the invasion once and for all, and this leads us into the film’s climax.

Invasion U.S.A. is, if nothing else, an interesting curio from the mid-1980’s, when these type of low budgeted and violent films were all the rage.  Whatever “shock” value the film had back then is long gone and I suspect much of this film could be shown intact on TV today (with the exception of some language and very, very brief nudity).  I also suspect that today’s audiences may groan at some of too-obvious flag waving.  The terrorists are never more than evil caricatures and their targets are also caricatures of good, decent, salt of the Earth American (the terrorists at one point plan to bomb a church while it is holding mass!  At another point, they try to blow up a school bus loaded with little children singing ‘row row row your boat’!  The heathens!!!).

Still, if you’re from that era and for whatever reason (up to and including dementia) you’re in the mood to relive the type of films they were feeding us back then, you could do worse than spend some time with Chuck fending off the Invasion U.S.A.

Otherwise, I suggest you steer very clear.

Very clear indeed.

Movies

The War Wagon (1967) a (helluva) belated review

There are movies that people remember or, conversely, forget for all the right reasons.  Some may be classics of cinema while others may amount to simple (or guilty) pleasures.  A whole host of others you may actively like, dislike or, worst of all, forget over time as they were too mediocre to bother with.

John Wayne, according to IMDB, has an incredible 179 acting credits on his resume from his first screen appearance in 1926 to his last in 1976.  Thus in those fifty years he appeared on average in a little more than 3 films (as well as a handful of TV shows and shorts) per year.  Its been said that no other Hollywood actor has appeared in as many leading roles in movies than he has.

I can certainly believe it.

Today, John Wayne is probably best known for his “seminal” or “classic” movie roles in Stagecoach or The Searchers or Red River or The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance.  If these titles mean absolutely nothing to you, then you may have heard of True Grit, the film that gave John Wayne an Oscar in the late 1960’s and which was recently remade by the Coen Brothers with Jeff Bridges in John Wayne’s role.

While the films listed above barely scratch the surface of the staggering number of classic works John Wayne was involved in (trust me, there are many, many more worth of checking out!), the sheer number of films he made naturally means that some would, inevitably, be forgotten.

Which brings us to The War Wagon.  Released in 1967 and co-starring the also legendary Kirk Douglas, The War Wagon is a delightful comedic heist film whose big distinction is its wild west setting.  Most heist film tropes are well represented here: The leader of the group, Taw Jackson (John Wayne) has a very personal reason for wanting to do this particular heist.  The group he hires to help him do the job are a motley bunch with certain “skills” as well as liabilities.  Of course, many of them don’t see eye to eye.  Finally, their target, in this case the armor plated “war wagon”, is something that’s considered “heist proof”.

Sounds familiar, right?

But what makes The War Wagon work is the interplay between stars John Wayne and Kirk Douglas.  These two movie legends go at each other playfully, sarcastically, and, for the most part, hilariously.  By 1967, John Wayne and Kirk Douglas knew exactly what their cinematic strengths were and, in this film, they play them to the hilt.  John Wayne’s Taw Jackson is a mountain of a man who says little and lets his fists (and guns) do his talking when need be.  Yet he is also a grounded man who, despite the larceny he’s currently working on, is an honest soul.  So honest, in fact, that by the end of the film (I will be cautious here about spoilers), can’t lie about the end result of the heist to someone he could easily have.

Kirk Douglas’ Lomax, on the other hand, is a slick slick slick gun-for-hire that values money above everything else.  Mr. Douglas projects larger than life grandiosity (not unlike what he did in Spartacus) and pushes and pushes this grandiosity until it runs just shy of outright buffoonery.  And yet, there’s still a danger about his character, a feeling that he might switch sides and leave his mates stranded…or worse.  He’s in it, after all, for the money and nothing more.

I’ve seen The War Wagon on television over the years and always found it an entertaining ride.  However, when the BluRay was finally released this week, I had to pick it up and see the film the way it was meant to be seen in its proper aspect ratio.

What a delight!

Ok, let’s face it: While The War Wagon may not be one of John Wayne -or Kirk Douglas!- all time best films, it is a very solid piece of popcorn entertainment and seeing this movie the way it was meant to be seen was eye-popping.  The rocky vistas the movie takes place in are grand and filled with a natural beauty.  The towns the characters stop in have a gritty look that feels genuine.  And the story moves along at a well-oiled clip, giving us action and humor in equal doses along with a very satisfying conclusion.

If there’s one major negative, for me it would be in Keenan Wynn’s role as Wes Fletcher.  Mr. Wynn, another legendary actor known for a wealth of great character roles in a number of features, is unpleasantly one-note in this film.

Still, this “problem” is hardly a mortal one and its puzzling that The War Wagon isn’t better known today.  Perhaps now, with the release of the BluRay, a new generation of film goers might find some fun in this unfairly forgotten film.

Recommended.

Movies

The Colony (2013) a (mildly) belated review

I first heard of The Colony via a trailer presented when it was available on pay-per-view.  The trailer hit a few buttons within me.  Post-apocalypse?  Check.  Snowy setting?  Check.  Laurence Fishburne and Bill Paxton sharing screen time!?  Check and check!

My curiosity was piqued.

But not without some hesitancy.  After all, what we had here was a direct to video feature with almost no early (good) word.  Further, a quick intenet investigation revealed mostly negative comments about the feature.  Nonetheless, those elements listed above, plus this IMHO effective trailer, had me interested…

So…is The Colony worth your time?

Sadly, the answer is resounding no.

Before getting into the negative, let me offer the few positives: For a low budget film, this one features some pretty good effects.  Not great, not always, but pretty good.  The film also presents a decent attempt at creating a colony “world”.  Plus, you have the already mentioned Laurence Fishburne and Bill Paxton.

That, sadly, pretty much ends the positives.

The film’s premise is this: Because of global warming, society created machines to “cool” the world down.  But the machines either malfunctioned or worked too well and Earth entered a new ice age.  Survivors huddled together in colonies, buildings that were mostly underground, and eeked out a bleak daily existence.  When the film opens, we find that a powerful “flu” is going around in the colony, and that people who have it and do not show signs of improvement are condemned to death rather than risk spreading it.

Into this already bleak existence our colony receives an SOS from another nearby colony.  The leader of our colony (Mr. Fishburne), gathers a pair of volunteers which includes Sam (Kevin Zegers, displaying very little charisma for the film’s protagonist), and they head off to the other colony to investigate.

What they find there is a bloody mess (I won’t give away more than that) and the troubles wind up following them back to their colony.

I have no big issues with either the plot or concept of the film.  Indeed, quite the contrary, I think there are ideas here that could have made for a potentially good little “B” film.  However, the movie disappoints as it moves along, alternately giving us too much plot and focusing too much on silly things.

For instance, the whole “flu” thing at the beginning of the film winds up being little more than a plot device intended to show us that Bill Paxton’s character is just a few steps away from being out of control.  It is very annoying that as a viewer Paxton’s character’s story arc is so clearly obvious to you while NO ONE around him, including the colony’s leader, realize this will be a problem.  Indeed, while Mr. Fisburne’s character notes that “changes will be made” regarding Paxton’s character, he nonetheless leaves the colony without taking him along, which of course allows the deranged character to gain control over things while the boss is away.

The danger presented in the other colony, too, had me a little confused.  Were the antagonists outsiders?  Were they the colonists gone bad?  A little bit of explanation might have helped.  Also, by the time we reach the movie’s climax, it winds up being little more than your typical siege event, with the bad guys rushing the good guys and…you can pretty much figure the rest.

Another element I found very annoying was the fact that the movie makers appear to be people who have no idea what it is like to be out in wintry/snowy cold.  To begin, why would you trek snowy territory without snow shoes or skis?  Understand, when the three head out to the other colony, they pass right through the heart of a city.  Surely at some point they could have found some snow shoes or skis there, right?  And assuming the colony is located in an area that used to be tropical (like Florida, though it is never mentioned where the colony originally was) and stores didn’t carry such items, then surely they could have made some?

On a crumbling bridge they find a van and three people, a father, a mother, and their child dead.  They have committed suicide.  Given the amount of snow around them, how exactly did they drive that van around?  Clearly the van and the victims are something new as later on, when our protagonists reach a crashed helicopter and camp out inside it, they mention already knowing about this way point.  Again, where did this van come from and how did it manage to drive along the snow?!

Further, when the characters are outside, they have no visible breath.  At all.  Yet we see them out there and they talk to each other and mention how cold it is and…no breath.  Not once.  When they reach the other colony and find a way into it, Laurence Fishburne’s character grabs a metal ladder with his bare hands before climbing down and into the structure.  Why he didn’t also stick his tongue on the ladder to complete the effect I’ll never know.

And finally, every outside shot features constant snowing.  Yet somehow our protagonist’s footprints manage to stick around long enough to allow the bad guys a chance to track them.

Really?

After the humdrum climax, our heroes are left in such a precarious situation that I don’t see how in the hell they’ll survive it.  Again, without giving too much away, they find that there might be a place where they can escape to, yet it is never revealed how far away this place is (we have to assume it is quite far as they know their immediate surroundings, certainly as far as to the other colony) and the survivors have no food on them for the trip and are dressed in what they wore within the colony itself…dress I have to assume is lighter than what they need on the outside!

In sum, a pass.  Too bad.  If a little more thought have been put into this film, I think it would have been far better than what it wound up being.

Movies

The Mean Season (1985) a (very) belated review

Back in 1985 Kurt Russell starred in The Mean Season, a crime drama/thriller set in Miami.  Mr. Russell was coming off quite a string of successful (if not always financially!) films, including at least three I consider among his best ever, 1980’s Used Cars, 1981’s Escape From New York, and 1982’s The Thing.

In The Mean Season Mr. Russell is Malcolm Anderson, a “burned out” reported for the fictional newspaper The Miami Journal who has just flown in from a small town in Colorado.  He likes it there and intends to quit his job in Miami and move to the quieter Colorado locale, but is convinced to look into the fresh case of a murdered teen whose body was found on the beach.  Anderson writes the story and tells his girlfriend Christene (Mariel Hemingway) this will be his last work for the Journal and they’ll be on their way very soon.

It proves a promise he cannot keep.

For the teen’s killer contacts Anderson and informs him that this is only the first of five murders he intends to commit. With the police leaning hard on him and the murderer making Anderson a celebrity, a game of cat and mouse between the principles ensues…Will Anderson help the police capture this sadistic and very clever killer, or will he become the killer’s target?

I had good, but vague, memories of The Mean Season from having watched it once or twice -or perhaps fragments of it- many years before.  When I noticed it was being played on cable, uncut, I set the DVR to record and it didn’t take me too long to give it the movie a look.  Why the eagerness?  In 1985 I started living in Miami full time, so I have a strong sense of nostalgia for that time and the area and I was hoping the film would offer some good memories.

Unfortunately The Mean Season, unlike the TV show Miami Vice, doesn’t dwell heavily on the sights and sounds of Miami of that time.  Sure, we’re given glimpses of places here and there (including Joe’s Stone Crabs and a view of the Miami skyline, much less busy than it is today), but the film tends to spend most of its time within various rooms and offices, which is a real shame.  In the end, one wonders why the producers bothered to set the film in Miami…it could have easily taken place in just about any big city.

The story is interesting, but the execution was rather…mediocre.  While almost every actor involved in the film does well in their roles, I felt they were playing characters rather than actual people.  The killer is evil and cunning, but we never really get a sense of what makes him tick.  Kurt Russell’s Anderson is a milquetoast reporter and it is not easy to root for someone who basically lets the prevailing winds blow him around.  Mariel Hemingway is the girlfriend who, predictably, sees that this story is leading her boyfriend down some very dark paths and of course it is only a matter of time before she became a target.  Finally, the detectives on the case (including a very young Andy Garcia) are also presented as characters rather than people, your typical “dedicated cops” who have seen the dark side of the world and will blow up at Anderson for his at times foolish ways.

The Mean Season proved a decent enough film that, unfortunately, you’ve seen many times before and since with varying degrees of skill (for example, while far more grisly, this film shares many of the elements found in Se7en).  The Mean Season falls right in the middle, neither terribly good nor terribly bad.  In fact, it winds up being so middle of the road that it could easily have been a TV movie featuring far less known actors if not for some salty language, one completely gratuitous -and very brief- nude scene involving Mariel Hemingway, and a small bit of gore that for 1985 audiences was probably strong but today could be shown on TV without much of a problem.

In the end, The Mean Season turned out to be a case where nostalgia was best left alone.

Movies

Machete Kills (2013) a (mildly) belated review

Back in 2007 director/writers Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez teamed up to make a “loving” tribute to the grindhouse cinema of their youth and released the appropriately titled double-feature Grindhouse.  While not without its charms, the film tanked at the box office.  And yet a curious thing happened on the way to failure: The “fake” commercials inserted before and in between the two movies become popular in a cultish way, and by far the most popular of the trailers was for a fictitious film called “Machete”.

As many know by now, the fake trailer proved so popular that a very real 2010 Machete film (you can read my review of it here) was made.  That film wound up doing enough business to justify a sequel, 2013’s Machete Kills.  While I felt the first film had its moments, as crazy a work as it was, I didn’t think it was nearly funny enough.  Would the sequel prove better?

Unfortunately, not really.

Machete Kills aims to be a broader, bigger, indeed crazier work than its predecessor.  Taking the plot of the 1979 James Bond film Moonraker (a little more on that after the review and trailer) as a launching point, we find Machete (the very game Danny Trejo) involved in the machinations of powerful industralist/genius Voz (Mel Gibson, looking like he’s having fun playing a crazed villain), who has a missile aimed at Washington and plans, not unlike Moonraker’s Hugo Drax, to rid the world of all its peoples while he and his group watch the apocalypse from outer space.  Once humanity is wiped out, they plan to head back down to Earth to repopulate it.

But wait, there’s more!

Into this broth we get the President of the United States (Charlie Sheen), Machete’s beauty queen contact on the border between Mexico and the U.S. (Amber Heard), the return of Luz (Michelle Rodriguez), a cameo by Vanessa Hudgens, a longer, crazier cameo by Sofia Vergara, and appearances by Antonio Banderas, Cuba Gooding Jr., and, why the hell not, Lady Gaga.

Given the circus-like atmosphere director/co-writer Robert Rodriguez was going for, its no small wonder that the first twenty or so minutes of the film are pretty fun, especially the “phony” trailer for Machete Kills Again…In Space, the movie that Mr. Rodriguez clearly intends to follow this one with.  Unfortunately, and like the first Machete film, craziness doesn’t always equal humor and while the film has the former in spades, like the first it lacks the later.

Still, Machete Kills is a fun enough experience even if it is never as funny as it intends to be.  While there was certainly enough craziness around to sustain a viewing, this is the type of film I doubt I’ll bother to see again, despite all the shenanigans.  If you enjoyed the first Machete film, you’ll probably like the second.  If you didn’t, then steer very clear.  And, if you were like me and found the first film enjoyable enough though not terribly great, you may wind up feeling just about the same after watching Machete Kills.

Now, getting back to Moonraker…

Sometimes it seems like creative thoughts are up in the air not unlike radio-waves, just waiting for people to pick up the tunes and make something of them.  How else to explain creative coincidences?

Back in 2010 and soon after seeing the Moonraker BluRay (the first time I saw that film from start to end since 1979), I realized there was an interesting enough plot in the film despite its terrible, IMHO, execution.  While Moonraker remains one of my absolutely least favorite James Bond films, in my mind I started to think about ways its story could be reworked into something better.

In the end, these musings proved an inspiration in the writing of the fourth novel in my Corrosive Knights series, Nox, released in August of 2012.

Cover to the novel NoxHaving said that, and for those who read the book and are scratching their heads wondering just where the Moonraker stuff is in it, don’t feel all that bad.  It’s there, but, unlike Machete Kills which took the entire concept and proudly used/ripped it off, in my book the inspiration winds up being a very tiny part.  Think about the goal of the villain and you’ll see the light.

Again, creative thoughts are fascinating things.  The wild coincidence of Mr. Rodriguez and me using Moonraker to some degree as inspiration in creating our own works is one of those head-scratchers that seem to happen to me very frequently.

To be clear, however, I do NOT believe Mr. Rodriguez read my book -which was released a full year before Machete Kills– and somehow gleamed the tiny Moonraker reference and had an “ah, ha!” moment before making his film.

More likely is that he, like me, happened to pop Moonraker into his BluRay player at about the same time I did and…well, you know the rest.

Creative coincidences?  Perhaps.  Nonetheless, fascinating stuff.

Movies

Thor: The Dark World (2013) a (mildly) belated review

Of all the movie genres out there, the one I have the hardest time getting into are musicals.  On an intellectual level, their appeal is obvious, combining song and dance and creating something that, when it works, can be sheer exuberance.

But they just don’t work for me.

Similarly, there are films I’ve seen that I’ve enjoyed quite a bit yet after the fact couldn’t help but feel that as good as they were, I have a hard time going out there and unhesitatingly recommending them to others.

Which brings us to last year’s Thor: The Dark World.  A sequel to (duh) 2011’s Thor, a film I quite enjoyed (though many others felt was a weaker Marvel Comics Movie event), Thor: The Dark World features more of the same and if you liked the original film but were underwhelmed by the spectacle (it was a lower budget film) might get your fill of spectacle here.

Chris Hemsworth returns as the God of Thunder and Natalie Portman reprises her role of Jane Alexander, Thor’s Earthly love interest.  Also returning are Anthony Hopkins and Rene Russo as Thor’s parents Odin and Frigga and, of course, Tom Hiddleston in the cult favorite role of Loki, half-brother of Thor and resident scheming villain.

The plot this time around focuses on “Dark Elves” who have access to some kind of very powerful weapon known as Aether.  It is capable of destroying the entire universe and, in the past, they tried to do just that but were defeated at the hands of Odin’s father and his army.  Anyway, in the “present” Loki is imprisoned for what he did in The Avengers while Jane Alexander somehow gets teleported to where the Aether was hidden all those years before (this is one of the film’s biggest plot contrivances and, if looked at in any logical way, makes absolutely no sense).  She accidentally merges with the gloppy weapon which in turn resurrects the Dark Elves.  They pursue Jane all the way to Asgard, the home of the Norse Gods, while Thor tries to keep her safe.

After a tragedy hits very close to home and with the fate of the universe in the balance, can the unlikely teaming of Thor and Loki save the universe from the return of the Dark Elves?

As I said before, if you liked the first Thor film chances are you’ll enjoy the second, although this film overall isn’t, in my opinion, quite as good.  Luckily, what I found most enjoyable about that first film was replicated well in the second, and that is the way Chris Hemsworth’s Thor reacts/interacts with “our” world.  Whenever the story shifts to Earth and we get to see Thor among us lowly humans, I couldn’t help but smile.  If nothing else, Chris Hemsworth has an incredible ability to mine gold from these interactions (check out what he does with his hammer upon entering Jane’s apartment or get a big laugh -the biggest one of the film- from something as simple as seeking directions).

What’s not quite as good, unfortunately, is a lot of the rest.  The scenes in Asgard are grand but, to me, not terribly involving.  The villain(s) are pretty flat and underwritten.  They’re bad and want to do bad things…aaaannnnd…that’s about all there is to them.

Of more concern is the romance between Thor and Jane, which worked in the original film but this time around felt unlikely, if not forced.  As much as I find Natalie Portman to be a very, very good actress, her work here was off.  It’s like this time around she never had a good handle on her character and as a result whatever “spark” there was between her character and Thor’s is virtually non-existent here.  In fact, there was a far stronger romantic spark present in the one (one!) brief scene between Jamie Alexander’s Sif and Thor, where they talk privately and it is obvious Sif longs for the God of Thunder.  The spark was so intense and their chemistry so much better that as a viewer I couldn’t help but wonder what exactly Thor saw in this Jane Alexander person.

Despite all this, Thor: The Dark World is nonetheless a perfectly good, if not great, superhero film.  The flaws are there but none of them are fatal.  The movie delivers a fun experience and is rarely dull.

Which brings us back to this whole “musical” thing I was talking about before.  As much as I may like the original film and feel the sequel is certainly worthy, there’s something about the character of Thor and the whole Norse mythology thing that has never appealed to me all that much.  It’s a real baffling thing as I’m a great fan of the comic book works of Jack Kirby (who created the Thor character along with Stan Lee) and absolutely love his pseudo-sequel to the whole Norse Gods concept in The New Gods.

Yet the character of Thor, Loki, and his “universe” within the Marvel Universe just never did all that much for me.

Still, the film is certainly worth a look.