District 9, Enjoyment 6

No, I would not like to read any pamphlets.

District 9 was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Picture, which is quite the achievement for a foreign-made science-fiction film about bug-like aliens who are essentially forced to live in a South African interment camp after their spaceship runs out fuel in orbit over Johannesburg. 

There are so many things that work in this film, most notably the special effects which are so seamless, you easily forget that these creatures aren't actually living, breathing entities. Unfortunately, even though I was able to fully immerse myself into the movie, eventually, it collapses under its own weight, and by the final act of the film, whatever interesting social commentary had been present in the first half of the film (the "aliens" are more "human" than can be seen via the lack of humanity shown by humans to each other) disappears and you're left trying to figure out when Michael Bay took over the director's chair and when Shia LaBeouf is going to jump out and join the explosion-fest. 

How do you say "Optimus" in Swahili?

Not only was the film's final act "transformation" unfulfilling, but the whole concept of the movie was that we were watching a documentary about what happened to main character Wikus. Interviews done after-the-fact and found footage are weaved artfully together to get us up to speed on how the aliens arrived and what they are doing on earth. The film does such a good job in this regard that it didn't even occur to me to question the fact that every alien understood English and every human understood Bug-arian, when in practice, that wouldn't make any sense. 

After a time, though, you realize much of Wikus' journey would never have been captured on film, and while it is a testimony to Neill Blomkamp's direction that the story doesn't screech to a halt due to this erratic inconsistency in the point of view of the storytelling, it still counts in the "imperfection department" as a strike against the movie.

There were plenty of things to like about District 9. The achievement in special effects is to be praised. The overall concept was sublime. But in the end, it just didn't hold up to all the critical acclaim. An "A" for effort, but at best, a "B-minus" in terms of delivery. 

Drag Me to War (Spoilers Within)

Bad things happen in dark cellars...

I just caught up on two movies that had been sitting in my DVR, just begging to be watched. The first was Sam Raimi's Drag Me to Hell, and the second was Quentin Tarantino's Inglourious Basterds. While I was hoping to enjoy both movies, I had no idea that I'd be viewing perfectly complimentary works of art. 

With Raimi's work, you know it's going to be campy horror -- more "startles" than actual scares and a fair share of Rube Goldberg-styled cartoonish violence in lieu of the current glut of torture and sadism. In contrast, with Tarantino, you know you're going to get long scenes of witty dialogue and philosophical debate, punctuated by bursts of horrific gore. 

The two styles could not be more distinct, and yet, like two sides of the same coin, they somehow come to the same conclusion on morality. 

In Drag Me to Hell, Christine Brown wants a promotion at her job. She is disgusted at the way her primary competitor for the position behaves in his attempts to curry favor with her boss, and refuses to stoop to his level. She's far too decent a person to sell her soul to the bank just for a few extra dollars in her paycheck... and believes her decency and hard work will win out... 

However, when an old gypsy woman comes in begging for yet another extension on her delinquent mortgage, Christine asks her boss what she should do. He says it's up to her to decide, and she takes that to mean she needs to reject the old woman's request. For her efforts, the gypsy puts a curse on her that will ultimately end up with her being dragged to hell by demons. 

Of course, the boss never actually said she had to reject the woman's request... Christine took it upon herself to make that call. Throughout the rest of the film, with her only goal now being to act in selfish self-preservation, she will agree to sacrifice animals, desecrate graves and even consider murdering completely innocent strangers, all in an effort to "atone" for her initial act of greed. 

By the end of the film, Christine only admits her wrongdoing when she believes herself to be free of the curse and in possession of the promotion, and therefore no longer subject to any repercussions. She has transformed from an innocent farm girl into someone deserving of all that evil that came her way during the movie.

The message is clear: do the right thing and show compassion to others or else you'll get what's coming to you. 

Now, let's look at Inglourious Basterds. This movie does not take place in everyday society, but rather in a time of war. The rules are different here... in order to survive, you cannot show compassion. Any act of kindness or concern for the welfare of others will result in death. 

Shoshanna (Tarantino's innocent farm girl) only meets her tragic demise after she has a pang of remorse about shooting Fredrick. Bridget von Hammersmark's treachery is only brought to light because she had signed an autograph for an adoring fan at a time when she would have felt bad about being rude to him. The German soldiers who escape the clutches of the Basterds along the way? Those are the ones who betray their fellow countrymen's positions, trading their own lives for theirs. Those who show blind loyalty to "the cause" end up both dead, and with a gruesomely receding hairline to boot. 

They say war is hell -- and living at a time and place where more often than not your only chance at survival is by killing before you get killed yourself is certainly not a place I ever want to find myself. I'd much rather live where respecting others and lending a helping hand is the preferred (and rewarded) course of action... 

After watching these movies, on this, I think both Sam Raimi and Quentin Tarantino would agree. 

How Can I Spoil Something That's Already Bad?

Who killed Scream 4? It was Kruger!

Let me preface this by saying I am a big fan of the original movie Scream. Coming at time when nobody else had thought to write a horror movie script where the characters had actually ever seen a horror movie themselves, the screenplay was clever, refreshing and exciting. 

Not only that, but adding the icing on the cake was the fact that the killer was not a mindless killing automaton whose only rationale for slicing and dicing the cast was explained away as "pure evil" as was the norm at the time. In Scream, the killer was quite human and could be killed himself -- actually, themselves. Yes, the savory cherry on top was the twist that there were two killers working together, and not two. Again, at the time, that had rarely, if at all, been done before.

Now, I just saw Scream 4, and it was a huge disappointment -- not because it failed to recapture the magic of the original, but that it came so close to doing so before falling woefully short. Spoilers ahead, so if you don't want to know, stop reading.

There were really only two possible ways for this new movie to have lived up to the original's audacity, in my humble opinion. One would have been to have the three surviving cast members from the original films die. The other, to have one (or more of them) be the killers. Sadly, neither of these options happened -- although it appears that fault may not lie with screenwriter Kevin Williamson. 

I don't know what his original script looked like, but I do know that they brought in Ehren Kruger -- the auteur who penned the weakest member of the original trilogy, Scream 3 -- to do extensive rewrites, most notably to "fix" the ending. After seeing the result, it's clear to me that this turned the plot into a incomprehensible nightmare.

Actually, I look more like the younger Salinger sister...

The film clearly wanted to end with Sydney's death at the hand of her cousin, Jill. That final tableau had been foreshadowed throughout the movie and when it finally happened, it seemed  "right" to end that way. Now, having the killer actually survive the movie would be a huge twist -- and a divergence from the end of all three previous films -- plus, using the media's reaction to Jill's survival, calling her a "hero" with zero actual investigative reporting or fact-checking, would have been a perfect commentary on today's society.  

Unfortunately, that's not how it ends. No, instead we are treated to an implausible, hack job of an ending where Jill attacks Sydney -- who miraculously survived the stabbings -- in a somehow completely vacant wing of the local hospital. Jill subdues Dewey with a *sigh* bedpan, and holds Gayle at gunpoint until the killer is finally defeated by our eternal hero, Sydney -- just as Neve Campbell's character did in each of the first three movies.

Not only is this a preposterous scene, seemingly written just so Syd can fire off the clever bon mot, "Don't &%#$ with the original" but it also completely renders moot the social commentary that preceded it. 

Hold on, folks. I'm just an actor... I didn't write this crap.

I would have been willing to overlook the stupidity of some of the characters who died in this film, like the agent who gets out of her car in a failed effort to reach the stairwell to freedom in the deserted parking garage even though she has a working cell phone and could easily have dialed 9-1-1 from the safety of her locked vehicle. 

I would have excused the pathetic decision to have Anthony Anderson's cop character get stabbed in the head, piercing his brain, which should have caused him to die instantly, instead resulting in his slowly getting out of his car, blindly throwing punches at the air and ultimately firing off an unfunny one-liner before dropping dead. 

Whatever this film could have been it clearly changed once Kruger got his knife-like talons into the re-writing process, and that's a shame because even though Sydney survived in this version of the script, the franchise -- at least as far as I am concerned -- no longer has a pulse. 

Three Words - Star Wars Musical

If you've seen the title of my upcoming book -- and if not, simply scroll your eyes up -- then you'll probably not be surprised to learn that I have a soft spot in my heart for the original Star Wars trilogy... so while I don't have the financial wherewithal to help this project out -- I certainly can do my part in spreading the word:

New Moon, Same Crap

The Saga Continues... much to my chagrin

So, when we last left the gang of Twilight after the first movie, poor depressed Bella had nearly died at the hands of the Black-Eyed Peas, who had interrupted her baseball game with her vampire boyfriend and his family. 

In New Moon, the second movie of this planned five-part franchise, Bella turns 18 and goes back to Casa Cullen to celebrate. Unfortunately, she gets a paper cut while opening a present and young (admittedly, a relative term in vampire films) Jasper can't control his hunger -- and lunges after her, ruining the party. Of course, this is all fairly dumb, since all Bella wants for her birthday is to have Edward turn her into a vampire...  but Edward stubbornly refuses that request, and instead decides it's "too dangerous" for the Cullens to remain around. He breaks up with Bella and the family disappears.

Miserable, Bella sits in her room for months on end, in a montage sequence which served no purpose other than to waste several minutes of running time. Eventually, Bella snaps out of her funk long enough to spend some time with Jacob, who *shocker* reveals himself to be a werewolf in order to save Bella when will.i.am comes back for a midday snack.

There's some other stuff involving Bella seeing visions of Edward whenever she does something dangerous, like riding a motorcycle without a helmet, cliff diving, or running with scissors. Somewhere in all of this mess, Bella goes to the movies on a date with Jacob and a non-supernatural suitor, Mike -- who ends up getting sick and wants to simply go home (perhaps to his Mummy?)  

The plot sickens..

Evil Fergie returns to try and kill Bella, but the werewolf gang holds her at bay. But, wacky hijinks ensue when Jacob tells Edward over the phone that Bella's father is "arranging a funeral" and Edward somehow takes that to mean Bella is dead, rather than you know, ask "Whose funeral?"

Anyway, that's when Edward travels to Italy to visit the "oh so fancy" Volturi (pictured above). The Volturi are basically the vampire police and they all have mysterious powers and since Edward is now sad, he wants them to kill him, which they will only do if he reveals his true nature to humans. 

Bella arrives at the last minute -- despite the fact that Edward is hours ahead of her, and we actually watch several scenes of her driving around the Italian countryside -- to keep this from happening, but then the Volturi decide that either Edward must turn her into a vampire or they will kill her. Need I point out again -- this  is what she wants -- yet he again refuses.

But eventually it all works out when the "read your mind" vampire sees that the "see the future" vampire is telling the truth when she says that Bella will become a vampire before too long, so why don't the Volturi just let the Cullens go back home and instead eat those human tourists in the next room. Seriously, so cliche. I mean how many times have we seen that lame plot device used? 

Austin Scarlett, Volturi fashion designer

So how does New Moon end? Edward at long last agrees he'll turn Bella into a vampire -- um, soon. He'll do this even though if he bites her, the werewolves will end their truce with the vampires for biting a human, for the last time, EVEN THOUGH IT IS WHAT SHE WANTS!!! The only thing Bella has to do first? Marry Edward. 

Fade to black.

Roll credits.

Boom boom pow! 

Hey, gang... brace yourselves. I gotta feeling Eclipse is even worse...

Let the Games Begin!

I just finished reading The Hunger Games trilogy, by author Suzanne Collins. Yeah, it was intended to be read by those closer in age to book's protagonist, 16-year-old Katniss Everdeen, but then again so too were the Harry Potter series and Twilight, and they entered the public zeitgeist as well.

They're rushing this one to the big screen, with a release date of 3/23/12 for the movie version of the first novel, which has yet to be cast... 

On the surface, the story is not all that original. It takes place in a dystopian future, and an annual Shirley Jackson flavored lottery selects two tributes -- young teenagers --  from each of the country's 12 districts to compete in a Survivor/American Gladiators/Thunderdome battle called the Hunger Games. All 24 boys and girls enter the arena, and fight to the death in a televised bonanza, but only the sole survivor lives. 

Bella Swan, the heroine in Twilight, is sullen and depressed with her life because she has divorced parents who both love her and has to decide between her hunky vampire beau and her equally hunky werewolf suitor. Yeah, Bella, life is hard -- *eye roll*

At least we can understand why Katniss hates her life. Her father is dead, killed in a mining accident. Her mother is distant on her best days, and an empty shell of herself most of the time. She lives in District 12, the poorest of all the districts, where food is scarce and hope even scarcer. 

Although I found the third book to be a bit lacking in both substance and surprise, and a bit more tonally like Starship Troopers than the V for Vendetta/1984 feel of the first two books, I nevertheless enjoyed the read and appreciated both the depth of the characters, as well as the obvious political overtones. 

I look forward to the film, which is reportedly to be directed by Gary Ross (Pleasantville) -- a movie that turned what could have been a light-hearted comic romp through a 50's sitcom landscape into an unbelievable allegory about the civil rights movement of the 1960's. He's the perfect choice to craft a film that hopefully will make the PG-13 crowd think more about the Senate than Snooki. 

If that happens, maybe we all can win.

Pitchers and Vampires Report

Old enough to be Cy Young

So I broke down and watched Twilight recently. It only seemed fair to actually see the film that I had intuitively decided to mock over the past few years... and now that I have -- all guilt is gone. What a crap-tacular movie!  

In a nutshell, the story revolves around Bella Swan, a morose teenager who moves back in with her father, a sheriff in the small Pacific Northwest town of Forks, when her mother decides to go on the road with her minor league baseball playing boyfriend. 

There, she encounters the mysterious and uber-pale Cullen clan, who we learn are the adopted children of Mr. Jennie Garth, so there's nothing at all anyone, including school guidance counselors, should find creepy about the fact they all seem to be dating each other -- except for odd-man out Edward. Eventually, as you would expect even without being familiar with the story, Edward and Bella fall in love, which leads to much moping around and long scenes of sadness, since -- shocker -- Edward and his family are vampires. 

Actually, some of the new takes on "being a vampire" are somewhat refreshing... for instance, they can go out in the sunlight, but don't because doing so causes them to "sparkle" and thus would reveal their true identity. Hence, the reason they chose to live in a perennially overcast area. That's at least a creative way of not having to have every scene take place after curfew.

Shoeless Joe was on Team Edward

However, any chance the movie had at succeeding to capture my heart flew out the window when Edward takes Bella out on a date to play baseball with his family. And no, that's not a lame cover story the couple tells her naive father so they can go off on an illicit rendezvous. No,  apparently, vampires in Twilight actually love to play baseball -- but since these immortals are also super-strong, they can only play baseball during thunderstorms so that the "crack of the bat" from their Ruthian blasts does not draw attention to their exploits. 

(And of course their choice of uniform is reminiscent of the Chicago White Sox -- after all, they wouldn't have been able to go to any Cubs games until 1988 for fear of sparkling. Now that I think of it,  Glenn Close in The Natural must have been a vampire! Oh, no! Poor Roy Hobbs.)

See how she sparkles!

Anyway, the baseball game goes on for far, far too long, and probably would have gone on even longer except that suddenly the Black-Eyed Peas show up and want to eat Bella along with their peanuts and cracker jack. The rest of the movie involves the Cullens trying to keep Bella from getting stepped on like a leprechaun.

Some other stuff happens, but quite frankly, I've already forgotten... hopefully, there will be some sort of recap at the beginning of New Moon, which is next on my DVR queue. I'll let you know soon...  but in the interim, feel free to mock away!

"I Gotta (Bad) Feeling...

I Wish I Had Known

When I first heard about the film Knowing in 2002, I thought the concept was incredibly cool:  A time capsule is buried at an elementary school to be opened 50 years later. When the day finally arrives, it is indeed opened and the drawings that the children had placed inside horrifyingly depict every major tragedy that has occurred in the past five decades -- and there is one drawing left.

Not only that, but Richard Kelly, the director of Donnie Darko -- one of my favorite movies of all-time --was working on the script and was going to direct. I was very excited to see the movie… but it kept encountering delays and eventually Kelly left the project and I forgot about it.

However, with the snow coming down and a free Showtime preview on my dish, there it was on the schedule, just begging to be watched. Sure it starred Nicolas Cage, who plays only two types of characters -- manic depressives and over-the-top manic -- and in both cases, monumentally stupid characters at that. But, nonetheless, I wanted to see what director Alex Proyas, who had helmed the underrated Dark City, had done with the cool story.

Disappointed much? You bet I was. 

Although the story still has a time capsule, gone was the concept of children's drawings depicting disaster. Instead, one little girl, freshly cut from the now-requisite Samara mold of pale and sullen creepy kids, writes out a endless series of seemingly random numbers -- or are they?

Flash ahead to the opening of the time capsule, where Cage's son gets to open the envelope with the numbers. Although Cage spends the night in a drunken stupor, because the single dad still mourns the loss of his wife in a tragic fire, a portion of the numbers catches his eye. He writes these numbers on a dry erase board, but can't quite figure out why they seem to resonate with him -- is it 91-10-1? No, that's not it…  Wait a minute! It's 9/11/01!

Right here the film starts to lose me… I'm actually fine with the idea that he might have seen 9/11/01 in the grid of numbers and then taken a closer look. But for him to decide to play with that particular string of numbers at random without recognizing it as an important date in history? Come on! It's not like he was staring at that day's Jumble and absent-mindedly found a word.

Nevertheless, Cage uses his Google skills to shockingly discover that this list of numbers actually contains a series of dates where tragedies took place, followed by the exact number of people who died in each disaster. I'll actually be generous here and throw the script-writers a bone, and let it slide that the "official number of victims" of many tragedies often changes from when the first news stories get written. There are far bigger fish to fry.

Cage, by the way, is a professor at MIT, so he's supposed to be a big smarty-pants. He shows his discovery to his colleague, best-friend and fellow smarty-pants along with the revelation that there are three tragedies left on the list (all conveniently forecast to occur within the next week) and is met with a resounding "you're nuts and seeing things because you're still in mourning over your wife's death."

Look, I'm not saying if faced with that situation in real life that I'd blindly buy in that this pattern was forecasting future doom. I'd probably assume someone was pulling an elaborate practical joke of some sort, but clearly there was no mistaking that there was a pattern there. The proper response from the guy who clearly understood that he was dealing with manic-depressive/manic Cage would have been to say that when the next date passed and the pattern was broken, would he please promise to seek some grief counseling.

Instead, he challenges Cage by pointing out that there were a whole lot of numbers that they didn't know the meaning of in between the dates, therefore the whole thing still seems random to him. Which is kind of like seeing a page full of seemingly random letter strings, having someone say that they've figured out that these are actually words in French and that you dismiss his theory as lunacy because although he identified "bonjour" and "aurevoir" he doesn’t know what the string of letters "savoirauncomplotmuets" means.

Anyway, the next day, Cage figures out what those other numbers mean. While driving to pick his son up from school, he gets stuck in a traffic jam and while sitting there, his gaze falls upon the GPS in his car. The "extra" numbers, he now realizes, are the location of the disaster, and he is sitting on the site of the one predicted for that day. He gets out of the car to see what is going on and a plane crashes right in front of him.

Again, I'm willing to accept this conceit for the purposes of the movie. It's the next step that makes no sense. Cage plugs in the numbers and figures out the exact street corner in New York City where the next disaster will occur. He then calls the FBI anonymously and tells them to clear the streets there, as a "terrorist attack" is imminent, gets in his car and drives to said street corner.

When he sees that it appears to be business as usual, he gets upset and walks up to a police officer and asks why they haven't shut down the intersection. The cop has no idea what he is talking about, and he angrily declares that he phoned in the warning, so why haven't they done anything. At which point she walkie-talkies "It's him" to a bevy of government agents who had been lurking nearby and a chase of sorts ensues, leading Cage into the subway… two trains crash, killing the expected number of people and fulfilling the prophecy, and Cage simply walks away.

The film only gets worse from here as the final predicted death toll is shown to be not "33" as written, but actually "EE" since we learn the young creepy girl often would write letters backwards, and in fact, stands for "Everybody Else." Yes, the final disaster is Armageddon, caused by deadly solar flares that, if they actually occurred as explained in the movie would not actually do the damage that it eventually does, killing everyone on the planet…

…Oh, except of course for Cage's son and the granddaughter of the creepy girl who are saved by being ushered away in a spaceship by a quartet of mute Spike-from-Buffy-looking aliens and brought to a new Eden-esque planet. Did I forget to mention that whole subplot?

I wish I could read one of Richard Kelly's drafts, but I fear that's trapped in a forgotten time capsule somewhere, never again to see the light of day. But since that is not to be, allow me to offer to you my own secret warning code:

KNOWINGISANAWFULMOVIEPLEASEDONOTWASTEYOURTIMEWATCHINGIT

Big Fan? As A Matter of Fact...

George Clooney, eat your heart out.

I just finished watching Big Fan, a movie starring Patton Oswalt as a lifelong Giants fan whose love of his team is pretty much all he has in this world. His job sucks, his family doesn't understand him and from the outside looking in, you feel sorry for this pathetic loser who, in his late-30's, still lives at home with his nag of a mother. 

And yet, Oswalt's Paul is perfectly content with his lot. He is happy to spend his Sundays in the parking lot of the Meadowlands with his best friend, in the shadow of his heroes, watching their exploits on the portable television set they bring with them because they are too poor to afford the tickets to the games. 

Paul is also a regular caller on a sports talk show, and it is there where he shines. His daily on-air tirades earn him more than enough admiration and respect to get him through the day. His fandom of the Giants defines who he is, so when fate gives him a chance to meet his favorite player... he embarks on a journey into a world that can only end in disaster...

Therein lies the brilliance of this film. Paul is simultaneously pathetic and heroic, admirable and cowardly -- and in the movie's final confrontation, Oswalt's performance builds the tension to a pitch-perfect point before the character's fatal flaw, his lack of ambition surfaces again. 

The pacing of the movie could use a little tightening up, but other than that I have no complaints, and I look forward to more dramatic work from comedian Oswalt, who in the past has also strutted his serious side in a few episodes of the under-appreciated television show, Dollhouse. 

I get that some viewers of the film might well be "disappointed" in the ending that writer/director Robert D. Siegel presents, and at first glance, it is a bit disappointing that it didn't go down the much darker path that I was expecting... but upon reflection, that choice is exactly why the film  works, because ultimately that's the point. Paul can't go down that road, because he simply can't. He lacks the ability. 

Are you looking at me? Oh, you are? Sorry, my bad...

Watching Paul's decisions throughout the film, you shake your head in amazement as he goes down what most people would clearly see as the wrong path at each and every crossroad -- but he doesn't really have the choice. He is a broken and flawed man, and yet, Paul ends up in exactly the same place at the end of the film as where he started: happy and hopeful -- and if that's truly the case, then who are we to judge?

A Very Harried Sequel

 Cast photo from "A Very Potter Sequel"

I admire these guys a lot. After putting together a brilliantly crafted musical based on the Harry Potter novels in 2009, there was nothing left for a sequel, or so it seemed -- a fact playfully pointed out by Lucius Malfoy during the opening number of said sequel.

Although this second go-around is far too talky and there's a lot of unnecessary reliance on potty humor -- literally -- there's a lot to like here. The cast's vocals, when the songs finally arrive, are superior to the originals, specifically, the duet between Sirius Black and Harry Potter in front of the Mirror of Erised. Plus, the choreographed Quidditch match is a real hoot.

It's not ready for Broadway, by any means, but certainly well worth the watch and considering how quickly it all came together... full OWLs to Darren Criss and company.

Inception Introspection Sans Spoilers

I was among the many millions of people who ventured out the local multiplex this past weekend to take in Christopher Nolan's latest film, and I was not in the least bit disappointed. 

The acting is top-notch -- not a single weak link in the entire cast -- and the story has as many layers to peel back as the dream state that it uses as its playground.  It does get a little tedious during the  Bond-esque tundra battle, especially since it's nigh on impossible to keep track of which character is which when they're all dressed up like eskimos... but you know a movie has worked when the final scene elicits an audible reaction from the theater. 

The big "unanswered questions" of the film pertain to whether or not the whole story is or is not a dream, if so, who is actually doing the dreaming, and how can any of us tell the difference between what we believe to be reality and something that simply isn't. The fact that watercooler debate and  message boards are still running rampant with "I'm right... No, I'm right" discussion simply proves one thing... Christopher Nolan pulled off his own inception.

He's planted the idea that you could possibly figure out a "correct" interpretation of the film, and doggone if some people aren't going to see the movie over and over and obsess over every little detail until they are sure they have it all figured out. Then they're going to try and convince all of those who simply don't see it that way to see it that way, and will hear no other argument to sway them from their own point of view.

If that doesn't sound like a planted idea growing into a virus, then I don't know what does. Well played, Nolan. You've spun your top well.

Remake a Rec

I recently saw the Spanish horror film [REC] directed by Jaume Balaguero and Paco Plaza. It's a movie that follows in the footsteps of Blair Witch and Cloverfield, that of the "found footage" genre where the audience's point of view is that of a video camera.

I must admit I was not expecting much, but it turned out to be an amazing film. The fact it was not in English - though subtitled, I do not habla - added to the aura of confusion for me. The characters, though mostly there to be "monster fodder" each had personalities without feeling like stereotypes. The guy I called "Senor Furley" was a particularly entertaining performance to watch.

Beyond that, the film had an artistic flair to it, and there's one particular shot down a spiral staircase that is both horrifying and at the same time, dare I say, beautiful. It was unlike any horror film I have ever seen, even though the story and plot were nothing too far removed from your standard zombie film.

Of course, Hollywood can't leave a good thing alone and decided to make it's own version of the same exact film. Not exactly shot-for-shot, but certainly beat-for-beat.












Unfortunately, it simply doesn't work. The production value is too slick, removing any of the "realistic feel" of the movie. Not only that, but whereas you're rooting for the young reporter in [REC], in Quarantine, you end up identifying only with the cameraman, played by Steve Harris from The Practice.


That's a testament to his acting ability, as he spends most of the film off-screen, behind the camera. However, it also speaks to a complete misfire on the part of the creative team that simply didn't get it and made a film about a raging contagion far too sterile to be interesting. 

Especially comical to me was near the end of Quarantine, where, as in [REC],  the  remaining survivors discover a tape recorder. In [REC], that allows new information to be imparted that provides context for what we've seen so far in the film. In Quarantine, it doesn't work. Literally. The tape recorder doesn't work, making it's discovery completely pointless, and only there because it existed in the original.

Do yourself a favor, seek out [REC] as well as its innovative sequel and leave the American version where it belongs - isolated from the rest of the world and kept under wraps.

Dial 9 For Murder

Won't get fooled again?

Session 9 is actually a pretty decent psychological thriller which may or may not have supernatural overtones - that's a debate you'll be sure to have once the film reaches its conclusion. 

I have to admit, I was not expecting much, especially given the inclusion of the one and only David Caruso in the cast, but he was surprisingly effective in the role of the second-in-command of an asbestos clean-up crew who get more than they bargained for in a job needed to be finished in a hurry at an abandoned mental institution.

Unfair as it may be, though, there is one scene in particular involving Caruso and a pair of sunglasses that took me right out of the movie, waiting for The Who to kick in. Not exactly the feeling of dread the director likely had in mind at that crucial moment in the film, I'm sure...

Something Spooky This Way Comes

 Anybody seen the powder?

I love horror movies, and I'm finally getting a chance to catch up on a huge -- read, nearly a decade -- backlog of titles. Thanks to the internet, I was able to check in this week with the low budget hit, "Paranormal Activity" and here's what I think...

Love the conceit of the super-fast time code to speed along the night to the "good parts" and absolutely commend the film-makers on the framing of the bedroom door and hallway, which simply begs the observer to create context out of the shadows.

Totally bought the acting -- it's harder to make "fake" casual dialogue seem real than you think, and the haunted couple totally pulled it off. 

What I hated? The boyfriend was so unlikable that I would sooner believe in demons living in the attic than I would the fact that she stayed with him throughout the entire movie. And, without spoiling the finale, let's just say that not a single one of the three endings that you might have witnessed, depending on the version you watched is really any good.

Still, given the budget and the self-promotion that it took to make this indie effort a hit complete with it's own sequel (trailer below), I have to applaud the effort... if not the entire package.

Take 2

Here's another movie mistake that I remember seeing in the theater, though I have to say, it's not nearly as egregious as I had recalled. It's from Cape Fear - the DeNiro remake with a completely unwatchable Juliette Lewis as the naive young lass who bad Bobby harasses throughout the film.

At around the 4:50 mark, Ileana Douglas starts fiddling with the buttons on her shirt, and clearly opens it up further. She must have the quickest hands in the West, as a shot later she's all buttoned to the top, only to back to her flirty self in a heartbeat.

Don't these editors care?

Fat Guy Celebrates!

I was reading the blog of a friend of mine, Shawn Peters, and his rant on the upcoming Karate Kid "remake" when I read the following comment "Look, I'm happy to look past small inaccuracies and plot holes if I enjoy a movie. We all know that someone must have batted out of order in 'Major League' to get Jake Taylor up to bunt in the 9th. Whatever."

That made me harken back to what I consider one of the most glaring continuity errors I've ever seen in a legitimate Hollywood movie - not so worried about those mistakes on SyFy's monster of the week fare. I call it "Fat Guy Celebrates." Watch at around the 2:16 mark for the grey sweaty guy jumping on the field in front of Rene Russo... and then watch behind her a few seconds later when she takes the field herself, just before the credits roll.

You mean to tell me nobody noticed this?

Who's That? - Episode IV, A New Hope

People, people... you're all letting me down.

Well, not all - Hoopachoo is doing his part by humiliating himself with horribly wrong guesses after a shocking upset early on in this trivia battle. In many ways he's the Northern Iowa of this blog, but at least he's putting himself out there for all to see.

Come on folks! Post those guesses! Prove to me I have the smartest readers in all of blogdom.

Anyway, here's the answer to yesterday's "Who's That?" -

Stay back, clown!

It's the brother of Carol Anne from Poltergeist who apparently has survived whatever "curse" surrounded the making of the series of ghost stories and is a live and well today.

OK, buddies... today we have another child star "all growed up" - one whose identity might be a little easier to suss out - but who knows? Only time will tell. Can you tell me the name of this fellow's most famous co-star from the days of his youth?

Who's That? - Round 3

Nobody came up with the answer to the last challenge. However, a close look at the man in the striped shirt might help jog your memory of a scary Big Wheel ride through the halls of a vacated hotel and ice cream shared with Scatman Crothers.

REDRUM!

Today's mystery guest is here below... can you figure out what movie this actor was in? Post your guesses in the comments. Answer will be revealed tomorrow...

Who's That? - Round 2

OK, gang. Hoopachoo got it in one.

He somehow figured out (i.e. - totally guessed) yesterday's picture was indeed the bike riding paperboy stalker from Better Off Dead, looking for his two dollars. Today, we'll try a tougher one... at least I hope it's tougher.

Same rules apply. Give me the famous movie dialogue associated with one of the people in this photo. Answer will be posted on Monday.

Good luck!

Do You Know This Guy?

Here's a "current" photo of someone who hasn't acted in quite some time - but most people of my generation, if not all of them, still quote him quite frequently.

Anybody care to take a guess? No need to name him. Just provide the dialogue....