Okay, so this film has a few flaws. The lack of Casey Kasem voicing Shaggy is the biggest of these, although Billy West (aka Phillip J. Fry from Futurama) does a passable imitation. Also gone is the late great Don Messick, long-time voice of Scooby. Sadly, Messick died of a stroke the year before the release of Scooby-Doo on Zombie Island (1998), leaving the sorely underpar previous three Scooby-Doo movies as his latest legacy. Luckily, Scooby is a voice that's hard to get wrong, and Scott Innes fills in seamlessly.
Normally, the replacement of the two main voice actors for a cartoon would be devestating, but the previous three Scooby-Doo movies give Zombie Island nowhere to go but up. And up it goes, setting a tremendous new bar for SD movies to follow. And guess who we owe this renewed quality to? Who but the Japanese. For Zombie Island, Hannah-Barbera pass the reins over to a Japanese production company, and not a moment too soon. The previous three films' attempt at a slapstick humor format had nearly driven a once great franchise into the ground. The humor was abysmal, the lame puns were interminable, and the animation was downright deplorable. Zombie Island turns it all around.
For starters, no Scrappy. Let me repeat that. No stupid Scrappy-Doo. Thank fucking god. And better yet, the gang's all back! That's right, we get the original crew back: Fred, Daphne, Velma, and even the Mystery Machine. Hell, Zombie Island's clunky "getting the gang back together and filling in the gaps on where everybody's been" intro didn't even faze me, I was so overjoyed to have the original characters back.
Turns out, Daphne and Fred have been producing a television show, traveling around the country doing ghost hunter stuff. Unfortunately, all the "ghosts" have proven to be fake, in the tradition of the original "Scooby-Doo, Where Are You?" series. Feeling disaffected and looking for a change, Daphne and Fred enlist the help of their old partners in crime, and the gang head down to New Orleans to see if they can rustle up some real ghosts. After a few misadventures in the Big Easy, exposing convoluted plots involving fake ghosts, the gang head deep into the bayou on a tip about a real haunting.
Shortly after arriving on Moonscar Island, home of the hottest peppers in Louisianna, the gang encounter supernatural goings-on. The clues seem to point to the ghost of Moonscar the Pirate as the culprit, but is something more sinister going on here? As Daphne and Fred wrestle back and forth over a supernatural vs. earthly explanation, Scooby and Shaggy run afoul of the house's mistress and her numerous cats. What exactly is going on in the bayou? Why does the gardener act so suspicious? And are those real zombies rising from the swamp in the moonlight?
Zombie Island has thankfully abandoned the comedy format, although there are some good laughs in the film, derived mainly from a wry self-parodying humor. No stupid puns, no silly slapstick, no schtick. Instead, we see a return to the mystery roots of the show, and even a re-imagining of the traditional earthly explanation to supernatural events.
The animation here is superb, crisp and modern, yet retaining the high contrast and deep shadows prevalent in the original series. The cinematography is fun and inventive, utilizing flashbacks, fades, focus techniques, and unique camera angles that put the previous American-produced movies to shame. The score by Steven Bramson, while at times over-the-top, is exactly what this film needs. It's good enough, and professional enough, to denote this film as a serious effort in the Scooby-Doo catalog, and not just some piece of cinema trash or fluff. Even the incredibly cheesy montage/interlude songs and the Scooby Doo theme performed by Third Eye Blind (!?!!?) aren't enough to significantly detract.
Scooby-Doo on Zombie Island marks a triumphant return to really good Scooby-Doo. God love the Japanese.
Storyline & plot: 7/10
Cinematography & effects: 8/10
Music & mood: 7/10
Performances: 5/10
The Reverend says: 7/10
Monday, August 31, 2009
Pieces
I'll say this for Pieces (1982): it makes a really great MST3K-style group laugh riot movie. As a serious piece of cinema, it is fairly atrocious. We open on a home scene circa 1942. Little [insert generic little boy's name here.... I'll go with Timmy] is playing in his room. But what is Little Timmy playing with? Oh, it appears to be a puzzle featuring a nude woman.... who most definitely has an '80s hairdo despite this supposedly being 1942. Incidentally, this magical time-travelling room also has a pennant for the New England Patriots (joined the NFL in 1960) and a push-button phone (invented in 1941 but not publically available until 1963). Also, Timmy can't be older than 9; what the hell is he doing looking at nudie material? Anyway, Mommy comes in and sees Little Timmy looking at no-no naughty stuff, and goes freaking ballistic on him. Jeez, he's 9 years old, he probably doesn't even know what he's looking at, maybe a little patience, compassion, and discretion might work in dealing with him. As it is, she comes just short of smacking the shit out of him. Timmy does not appreciate this at all, and to show his disapproval, retreives an axe (from where, who knows?) and chops her to.... wait for it..... pieces. Except the obviously rubber axe bounces off Mommy's skull instead of sinking into it. Hilarious!
Fast forward 40 years (!) and a string of grisly murders has gripped a Boston area college. The murderer's weapon of choice? No axe this time; he's graduated up to a chainsaw! With occasional and random knife usage. Interestingly enough, the killer's chainsaw starts up every time on the first try with no problem. He must have the greatest chainsaw ever in the history of the universe, because I've NEVER seen a chainsaw start up on the first pull of the cord. The killer stalks the campus, preferring young nubile females, particularly if they are or have recently been topless or nude. He's also partial to dressing up like The Shadow, complete with huge black hat and cape. You'd think a guy walking around in a black hat and cape might be easy to remember, but apparently not.
So, it's pretty obvious to the audience at this point that we're looking for Little Timmy all grown up. What's not quite so obvious is where Timmy's been all these years and why he's just now getting back on murderous track. He hasn't been in jail or a hospital or insane asylum because we see him play innocent about his mother's death; the authorities never connect the murder to him. We are given no obvious trigger for renewed homicidal tendencies: no sexual spurning, no mother look-alike, no connection to the original crime or feelings of sexual frustration. Other than the connection of nubile young women, there's no reason why Little Timmy should suddenly start killing again. Are we to assume Timmy has not encountered a single attractive female in 40 years? The filmmakers are just being plain lazy here. If you're making a slasher movie, you need to have a consistent motive and M.O. If you're going to go through the trouble of setting up the backstory, why let it fall to pieces (hehe) later on?
As for the big "mystery" of who the grown up Timmy is, well, it's pretty obvious to anyone with a brain. Factoring in Timmy's age, we only have 3 possible suspects. One of those is a red herring you could smell from a mile away. Toss that one out. Now you're down to a 50/50 shot, and considering the lack of development of one of those suspects, the choice is clear. Apparently, the cops don't have much of a brain, because they initially fall for the red herring and then enlist some stupid doucheface college kid as an unofficial deputy to help solve the crime. This isn't some podunk law enforcement outfit here. It's the Boston police! They seriously don't have the resources for this case???
As I said, though, there are some really great WTF hilarious moments. When the red herring is approached by police about the murders, inexplicably, he goes crazy and starts throwing cops around like he's freaking Lou Ferrigno or something. It was awesome. And Pieces definitely has the greatest kung-fu cameo of all time. Just for shits and giggles, director Juan Piquer Simon throws in a Kung Fu instructor (what college has a Kung Fu instructor??? Bruce Lee University?) who randomly attacks our heroine, and then stumbles off and blames the incident on.... get this... bad chop suey! What. The. Fuck. And lets not forget the incredibly WTF ending shot, which makes no sense, but merely tries to capitalize on "the killer's not really dead yet" plot twist. Except it's not even the killer who pops up for one last jump scare. Huh? Yeah, this movie's just that.... awesome.
Storyline & plot: 3/10
Cinematography & effects: 3/10
Music & mood: 4/10
Performances: 4/10
The Reverend says: 3/10
Fast forward 40 years (!) and a string of grisly murders has gripped a Boston area college. The murderer's weapon of choice? No axe this time; he's graduated up to a chainsaw! With occasional and random knife usage. Interestingly enough, the killer's chainsaw starts up every time on the first try with no problem. He must have the greatest chainsaw ever in the history of the universe, because I've NEVER seen a chainsaw start up on the first pull of the cord. The killer stalks the campus, preferring young nubile females, particularly if they are or have recently been topless or nude. He's also partial to dressing up like The Shadow, complete with huge black hat and cape. You'd think a guy walking around in a black hat and cape might be easy to remember, but apparently not.
So, it's pretty obvious to the audience at this point that we're looking for Little Timmy all grown up. What's not quite so obvious is where Timmy's been all these years and why he's just now getting back on murderous track. He hasn't been in jail or a hospital or insane asylum because we see him play innocent about his mother's death; the authorities never connect the murder to him. We are given no obvious trigger for renewed homicidal tendencies: no sexual spurning, no mother look-alike, no connection to the original crime or feelings of sexual frustration. Other than the connection of nubile young women, there's no reason why Little Timmy should suddenly start killing again. Are we to assume Timmy has not encountered a single attractive female in 40 years? The filmmakers are just being plain lazy here. If you're making a slasher movie, you need to have a consistent motive and M.O. If you're going to go through the trouble of setting up the backstory, why let it fall to pieces (hehe) later on?
As for the big "mystery" of who the grown up Timmy is, well, it's pretty obvious to anyone with a brain. Factoring in Timmy's age, we only have 3 possible suspects. One of those is a red herring you could smell from a mile away. Toss that one out. Now you're down to a 50/50 shot, and considering the lack of development of one of those suspects, the choice is clear. Apparently, the cops don't have much of a brain, because they initially fall for the red herring and then enlist some stupid doucheface college kid as an unofficial deputy to help solve the crime. This isn't some podunk law enforcement outfit here. It's the Boston police! They seriously don't have the resources for this case???
As I said, though, there are some really great WTF hilarious moments. When the red herring is approached by police about the murders, inexplicably, he goes crazy and starts throwing cops around like he's freaking Lou Ferrigno or something. It was awesome. And Pieces definitely has the greatest kung-fu cameo of all time. Just for shits and giggles, director Juan Piquer Simon throws in a Kung Fu instructor (what college has a Kung Fu instructor??? Bruce Lee University?) who randomly attacks our heroine, and then stumbles off and blames the incident on.... get this... bad chop suey! What. The. Fuck. And lets not forget the incredibly WTF ending shot, which makes no sense, but merely tries to capitalize on "the killer's not really dead yet" plot twist. Except it's not even the killer who pops up for one last jump scare. Huh? Yeah, this movie's just that.... awesome.
Storyline & plot: 3/10
Cinematography & effects: 3/10
Music & mood: 4/10
Performances: 4/10
The Reverend says: 3/10
Sunday, August 23, 2009
Le Samourai
Jean-Pierre Melville's masterpiece Le Samourai (1967) represents a bit of a moral conundrum for me: Melville borrows the samurai, or rather, his superficial qualities and iconic image, from Japanese culture, leaving behind much of the history and cultural mythos. Yet far from a superficial usage, Melville appropriates the image of the samurai for his own deeply psychological and fatalistic ends. While I personally feel uncomfortable with this kind of cultural theft in the name of film, I also admire the spartan scripting and meticulous execution of Le Samourai, which in itself is analogous to the life of a samurai.
Jef Costello (Alain Delon) is our titular samurai: in this case, a gun for hire rather than a sword. He's steely-eyed, laconic, and cool. And he has no qualms about a little crime if the price is right. He'd just as soon kill a man as steal a car, as long as there was some money in it. And he manages to get the drop on just about everyone; his draw is preternaturally quick. In short, Jef Costello is a career criminal. He's in it for the long haul; he gets the job done and he doesn't stop until he's finished. In fact, a viewer might draw eerie similarities between our samurai and the T-800 and T-1000 model terminators from The Terminator films. While Costello accepts money for hits, his motivation to kill is neither financial nor personal. He does not enjoy killing; rather, much like Martin Blank from Grosse Pointe Blank (1997), he doesn't know what else to do. Killing is simply what he does, no more, no less.
Much like actual samurai, Costello's trajectory is wholly driven by and towards death. After a botched hit and a close call with the law, Costello is a marked man. His employers want him dead, and the Parisian police want to pin the murder of a high-profile nightclub owner on him. If he can silence the leading witness to the murder, he'll walk free and clear. But tracking her down will prove difficult, as Jef weaves his way through Paris's streets and underground, staying barely one step ahead of the ever-tightening police net.
There are some who place Le Samourai in the French New Wave movement of cinema, but frankly, this seems a bit of a stretch. While it's true that Melville follows the New Wave conventions of on-location shooting, the use of natural lighting, and a bare minimum of editing, he completely eschews the New Wave extemporaneous aesthetic. While the dialogue and sets are sparse and minimalistic, the film is tightly controlled by Melville. There are no wasted words, no wasted cuts, no wasted film. Everything down to the color of Jef's apartment walls is laboriously crafted by Melville's hand. In this way, in this deliberateness, in this micromanagement of the film, Melville flies in the face of the major tenet of New Wave, which is a rejection of rigid narrative storylines as despotic art. If I were to settle upon a label for Le Samourai, it would have to be hard-boiled, that close cousin to noir: gritty, realistic, fatalistic, centered around themes and stories from both sides of the law.
In Le Samourai, the set and sound design serve to contrast Jef's apartment with the Paris streets and the police headquarters. The film opens on a lingering static shot of the interior of Jef's apartment. While the opening credits unfold, the audience's eyes wander over the interior, searching for the focus. It is a very long time before it's even apparent that there is someone in the room, on the bed. We register Jef's presence only by the languorous wafting of his cigarette smoke. He does not move. He is completely still. The peeling and ancient grey walls give the apartment a surreal quality. The decor is spartan: a bed, two wooden chairs, a birdcage dead center. The bird, Jef's only companion. In a strange twist of fate, the bird, Jean-Pierre Melville's pet, was the lone casualty of a fire that destroyed Melville's studio the same year in which Le Samourai was released.
Jef's silent and empty apartment is immediately contrasted to Paris: loud, bustling, busy, hectic. Later, the apartment is again contrasted with police headquarters: angular, antiseptic, technologically-advanced. It is these subtle touches that make the film come alive. Jef himself is held in comparison to the police Inspector (Francois Perier). While Jef is taciturn, the Inspector is gregarious, grand, emotive. But both are supernaturally determined men. Jef will stop at nothing to finish a job once it is started, and the Inspector will not rest until he's tracked Jef down. It's a little bit of a classic cat-and-mouse game.
Check this one out if you like a classic hard-boiled crime thriller, or just a great French film.
Storyline & plot: 7/10
Cinematography & effects: 7/10
Music & mood: 8/10
Performances: 8/10
The Reverend says: 8/10
Jef Costello (Alain Delon) is our titular samurai: in this case, a gun for hire rather than a sword. He's steely-eyed, laconic, and cool. And he has no qualms about a little crime if the price is right. He'd just as soon kill a man as steal a car, as long as there was some money in it. And he manages to get the drop on just about everyone; his draw is preternaturally quick. In short, Jef Costello is a career criminal. He's in it for the long haul; he gets the job done and he doesn't stop until he's finished. In fact, a viewer might draw eerie similarities between our samurai and the T-800 and T-1000 model terminators from The Terminator films. While Costello accepts money for hits, his motivation to kill is neither financial nor personal. He does not enjoy killing; rather, much like Martin Blank from Grosse Pointe Blank (1997), he doesn't know what else to do. Killing is simply what he does, no more, no less.
Much like actual samurai, Costello's trajectory is wholly driven by and towards death. After a botched hit and a close call with the law, Costello is a marked man. His employers want him dead, and the Parisian police want to pin the murder of a high-profile nightclub owner on him. If he can silence the leading witness to the murder, he'll walk free and clear. But tracking her down will prove difficult, as Jef weaves his way through Paris's streets and underground, staying barely one step ahead of the ever-tightening police net.
There are some who place Le Samourai in the French New Wave movement of cinema, but frankly, this seems a bit of a stretch. While it's true that Melville follows the New Wave conventions of on-location shooting, the use of natural lighting, and a bare minimum of editing, he completely eschews the New Wave extemporaneous aesthetic. While the dialogue and sets are sparse and minimalistic, the film is tightly controlled by Melville. There are no wasted words, no wasted cuts, no wasted film. Everything down to the color of Jef's apartment walls is laboriously crafted by Melville's hand. In this way, in this deliberateness, in this micromanagement of the film, Melville flies in the face of the major tenet of New Wave, which is a rejection of rigid narrative storylines as despotic art. If I were to settle upon a label for Le Samourai, it would have to be hard-boiled, that close cousin to noir: gritty, realistic, fatalistic, centered around themes and stories from both sides of the law.
In Le Samourai, the set and sound design serve to contrast Jef's apartment with the Paris streets and the police headquarters. The film opens on a lingering static shot of the interior of Jef's apartment. While the opening credits unfold, the audience's eyes wander over the interior, searching for the focus. It is a very long time before it's even apparent that there is someone in the room, on the bed. We register Jef's presence only by the languorous wafting of his cigarette smoke. He does not move. He is completely still. The peeling and ancient grey walls give the apartment a surreal quality. The decor is spartan: a bed, two wooden chairs, a birdcage dead center. The bird, Jef's only companion. In a strange twist of fate, the bird, Jean-Pierre Melville's pet, was the lone casualty of a fire that destroyed Melville's studio the same year in which Le Samourai was released.
Jef's silent and empty apartment is immediately contrasted to Paris: loud, bustling, busy, hectic. Later, the apartment is again contrasted with police headquarters: angular, antiseptic, technologically-advanced. It is these subtle touches that make the film come alive. Jef himself is held in comparison to the police Inspector (Francois Perier). While Jef is taciturn, the Inspector is gregarious, grand, emotive. But both are supernaturally determined men. Jef will stop at nothing to finish a job once it is started, and the Inspector will not rest until he's tracked Jef down. It's a little bit of a classic cat-and-mouse game.
Check this one out if you like a classic hard-boiled crime thriller, or just a great French film.
Storyline & plot: 7/10
Cinematography & effects: 7/10
Music & mood: 8/10
Performances: 8/10
The Reverend says: 8/10
The Red Shoes
This K-horror sophomore effort from Yong-gyun Kim was just so-so for me. The Red Shoes (2005) comes a little late to the Asian horror party and brings nothing particularly unique to the table. Aside from some interesting cinematography, particularly in the use of focus, this film is extremely forgettable. The A-horror tropes are paraded out: the vengeful ghosts, the cursed object, the creepy child (but in this case not so much creepy as just angry and annoying), the pale people with long bedraggled hair that represent restless spirits. Yada yada yada we get it. The Red Shoes isn't even particularly frightening, at least on a deeper emotional or psychological level. We never really get to know any of the characters that well. They are skin deep, facades, superficial. There's really no one to root for or even care about in this film. Without this connection, we must go without deep terror. The best the audience gets are some jump-scares, and honestly, after a few of those, you begin to resent the filmmaker for being so lazy and manipulating your unconscious surprise reflex to mine some cheap psuedo-terror.
Sun-jae, a single mother recently divorced from a cheating husband, spies a pair of red women's shoes on the subway one night. Being somewhat shoe-crazy (she maintains a veritable shoe museum at home, with soft lighting and special display cases) and seeing no obvious owner, she picks the red shoes up and brings them home. Pardon me while I digress for one moment here. I don't know if there was a problem with translating the film's title, or the director was color-blind, or some catastrophic coloring fuck-up in post-production, but the titular shoes ARE NOT RED. They're pink. Possibly, and this a stretch, you might say they were cranberry, but they are most definitely NOT RED. It sorta bugged me through the whole movie.
Anyway, back to the story. The moment Sun-jae picks up the shoes, her life begins to change. Events start to spiral out of control, friends begin to die mysteriously, and Sun-jae is haunted both by spirits and by visions of the past, of a bloody wedding and a mysterious ballet dancer. Perhaps most disconcerting are the changes in her daughter, Tae-su. Tae-su is immediately captivated by her mommy's new shoes, and although they are clearly much too large for her, she covets them and wears them at any opportunity. Which only serves to make Sun-jae suddenly and uncharacteristically furious and violent. Sun-jae must unravel the mystery of the shoes and reverse the curse before it's too late.
So, here's the thing: cursed footwear is just not frightening. Perhaps the premise could be tapped for a surreal dark comedy, but horror, not so much. Maybe if this film didn't take itself so seriously, maybe if it had a little self-awareness, a little snide self-mocking, something, anything to let the audience know that the filmmakers weren't deadly frickin serious about a pair of cursed pink pumps.
The acting here is okay, I guess. But Hye-su Kim's portrayal of Jun-sae is a tad over-the-top, like she went to the Nic Cage school of acting, perhaps. And really, the only thing Yeon-ah Park (Tae-su) does is either stare blankly or be really childish and annoying. I would figure that wouldn't be much of a stretch for any 6-year-old.
I also have to deduct a few points from the music, because my ears felt violated after watching The Red Shoes. In theory, composer Byung-woo Lee's mix of high-pitched strings, digital sound bites, and various other odds and ends could have worked. If done right. This was all wrong. My ears felt like they were being raped on a number of occasions, as the strings would screech into some previously undiscovered octave and the digital white noise would overwhelm the entire film until I literally had to put my hands over my ears and scrinch my eyes in pain. Not really what you want your audience to be doing when they're supposed to be watching your film.
In my continuing search for good A-horror, I will inevitably run into tepid efforts like The Red Shoes. But for any of you out there looking for good Asian horror, I suggest you skip this one. Instead, watch some Takashi Miike, or check out something good like A Tale of Two Sisters (2003), Infection (2004), or Sick Nurses (2007).
Storyline & plot: 2/10
Cinematography & effects: 6/10
Music & mood: 3/10
Performances: 5/10
The Reverend says: 4/10
Sun-jae, a single mother recently divorced from a cheating husband, spies a pair of red women's shoes on the subway one night. Being somewhat shoe-crazy (she maintains a veritable shoe museum at home, with soft lighting and special display cases) and seeing no obvious owner, she picks the red shoes up and brings them home. Pardon me while I digress for one moment here. I don't know if there was a problem with translating the film's title, or the director was color-blind, or some catastrophic coloring fuck-up in post-production, but the titular shoes ARE NOT RED. They're pink. Possibly, and this a stretch, you might say they were cranberry, but they are most definitely NOT RED. It sorta bugged me through the whole movie.
Anyway, back to the story. The moment Sun-jae picks up the shoes, her life begins to change. Events start to spiral out of control, friends begin to die mysteriously, and Sun-jae is haunted both by spirits and by visions of the past, of a bloody wedding and a mysterious ballet dancer. Perhaps most disconcerting are the changes in her daughter, Tae-su. Tae-su is immediately captivated by her mommy's new shoes, and although they are clearly much too large for her, she covets them and wears them at any opportunity. Which only serves to make Sun-jae suddenly and uncharacteristically furious and violent. Sun-jae must unravel the mystery of the shoes and reverse the curse before it's too late.
So, here's the thing: cursed footwear is just not frightening. Perhaps the premise could be tapped for a surreal dark comedy, but horror, not so much. Maybe if this film didn't take itself so seriously, maybe if it had a little self-awareness, a little snide self-mocking, something, anything to let the audience know that the filmmakers weren't deadly frickin serious about a pair of cursed pink pumps.
The acting here is okay, I guess. But Hye-su Kim's portrayal of Jun-sae is a tad over-the-top, like she went to the Nic Cage school of acting, perhaps. And really, the only thing Yeon-ah Park (Tae-su) does is either stare blankly or be really childish and annoying. I would figure that wouldn't be much of a stretch for any 6-year-old.
I also have to deduct a few points from the music, because my ears felt violated after watching The Red Shoes. In theory, composer Byung-woo Lee's mix of high-pitched strings, digital sound bites, and various other odds and ends could have worked. If done right. This was all wrong. My ears felt like they were being raped on a number of occasions, as the strings would screech into some previously undiscovered octave and the digital white noise would overwhelm the entire film until I literally had to put my hands over my ears and scrinch my eyes in pain. Not really what you want your audience to be doing when they're supposed to be watching your film.
In my continuing search for good A-horror, I will inevitably run into tepid efforts like The Red Shoes. But for any of you out there looking for good Asian horror, I suggest you skip this one. Instead, watch some Takashi Miike, or check out something good like A Tale of Two Sisters (2003), Infection (2004), or Sick Nurses (2007).
Storyline & plot: 2/10
Cinematography & effects: 6/10
Music & mood: 3/10
Performances: 5/10
The Reverend says: 4/10
Friday, August 21, 2009
The Court Jester
Although she would probably contest my interpretation of the facts, my wife despaired of this movie when it arrived from Netflix. "So, it's like a kids movie from the '50s?" she asked with an incredulous tone and mockingly raised eyebrow. I proceeded to tell her that it wasn't really a "kids movie," just kid-friendly, in that it's from the '50s and they hadn't yet gotten around to putting gratuitous gore, violence, sex, and foul language into movies yet. Well, most movies, anyway. Of course, even after explaining it thusly, my wife still inquired the next day, "So, how did you find this kids movie from the '50s?" Sometimes it's hard to tell if she truly forgets or she's just fucking with my patience. Keeps me on my toes, at any rate.
So, how did I come to put The Court Jester (1955) on my Netflix queue, even though I knew relatively little about it myself, other than that it was NOT just a kids movie? Well, it started with a roommate from college. He was a very cool dude and I generally had no complaints with his recommendations vis a vis the consumption of popular culture. And he swore by this movie. Up and down. Said it was one of the best movies ever. Later in our college careers, after we had both moved to different residences, he even hosted a party where the central attraction was a viewing of The Court Jester. Sadly, I could not attend at the time. College ended and the film faded from my memory.
It was by chance, nay, perhaps by fate then, that some years later, Netflix's recommendation engine would place The Court Jester in my purview yet again. I instantly recognized it as the film my friend had glowingly praised, and added it to my queue.
Ironically, being the great fan and student of film that I am, I am very hesitant to research movies too heavily before I see them. Call me old-fashioned, but I enjoy novel experiences. I don't want every last detail of the film and its production before going in. That's for later, after viewing. Beforehand, I want only the bare minimum of information to make a reasonable inference as to whether I should watch a film. And so it was that I knew almost nothing of The Court Jester other than my friend's long-ago regard.
I can tell you, I was not disappointed, and my wife was pleasantly surprised. Within the first 10 minutes, we were hooked.
We open on medieval England. A pretender to the crown, Roderick, has just slain the entire royal family and usurped the throne. A band of loyalists simmers in the forest, planning to wrest the throne back from Roderick. Their secret weapon: an infant, the true heir to the English monarchy, spirited away from the royal slaughter by the notorious loyalist, the Black Fox, deadliest man in all of England. But to place the infant back on the throne, the Black Fox will need to infiltrate the castle with his men. The only way is a secret underground passage, and the only key lies with the new king Roderick. A man is needed on the inside, and the bumbling coward Hubert Hawkins (Danny Kaye) is just the man for the job. Impersonating Roderick's new court jester Giacomo, Hubert gains entry to the court. But getting in is only the beginning. Hubert will have to navigate many perils, including a witch, an iron-willed princess, a case of mistaken identity, and a jousting tourney to the death, in order to make it out alive.
This film is an exemplary model of a lovingly crafted spoof. Writer/directors Melvin Frank and Norman Panama lampoon the high adventure Robin Hood genre made famous by Errol Flynn. But far from a heartless and biting parody, The Court Jester never forgets its source material. It is as much a part of high adventure film as it is a spoof of it. There is plenty of swordplay, intrigue, romance, and murder to get you in the spirit. And then when you're into the swing of things, Danny Kaye comes along and throws you a slapstick curveball that has you laughing your ass off.
Kaye, a master of song and lyrical tongue-twisters, serves up a heaping portion here, including the hypnotically catchy "Maladjusted Jester" and the famous Pellet with the Poison bit. Kaye is sensational as Hubert/Giacomo, a kind of bumbling, funnier, livelier precursor to Kramer from "Seinfeld". Very solid performances from Cecil Parker (King Roderick), Basil Rathbone (the odious and unctuous Ravenhurst, King's councillor), and Angela Lansbury (the steely-eyed and disturbingly attractive Princess Gwendolyn) round out the film.
Seriously, what's not to love about a movie featuring an army of little people, for gods sakes? Interestingly, one can see some very suspicious similarities between The Court Jester and Monty Python and the Holy Grail (1975). These similarities are a little too suspicious to be coincidental, I think. Messieurs Chapman, Cleese, Idle, Jones, and Palin must have been fans of this film growing up.
So is The Court Jester a kids flick? I would say emphatically no, but at the same time, I think many children would enjoy it, so by all means, make a family night out of it. You won't be disappointed. High energy, great music, slapstick routines, and more subtle comedy; this is a really fun watch.
Storyline & plot: 8/10
Cinematography & effects: 7/10
Music & mood: 9/10
Performances: 9/10
The Reverend says: 8/10
So, how did I come to put The Court Jester (1955) on my Netflix queue, even though I knew relatively little about it myself, other than that it was NOT just a kids movie? Well, it started with a roommate from college. He was a very cool dude and I generally had no complaints with his recommendations vis a vis the consumption of popular culture. And he swore by this movie. Up and down. Said it was one of the best movies ever. Later in our college careers, after we had both moved to different residences, he even hosted a party where the central attraction was a viewing of The Court Jester. Sadly, I could not attend at the time. College ended and the film faded from my memory.
It was by chance, nay, perhaps by fate then, that some years later, Netflix's recommendation engine would place The Court Jester in my purview yet again. I instantly recognized it as the film my friend had glowingly praised, and added it to my queue.
Ironically, being the great fan and student of film that I am, I am very hesitant to research movies too heavily before I see them. Call me old-fashioned, but I enjoy novel experiences. I don't want every last detail of the film and its production before going in. That's for later, after viewing. Beforehand, I want only the bare minimum of information to make a reasonable inference as to whether I should watch a film. And so it was that I knew almost nothing of The Court Jester other than my friend's long-ago regard.
I can tell you, I was not disappointed, and my wife was pleasantly surprised. Within the first 10 minutes, we were hooked.
We open on medieval England. A pretender to the crown, Roderick, has just slain the entire royal family and usurped the throne. A band of loyalists simmers in the forest, planning to wrest the throne back from Roderick. Their secret weapon: an infant, the true heir to the English monarchy, spirited away from the royal slaughter by the notorious loyalist, the Black Fox, deadliest man in all of England. But to place the infant back on the throne, the Black Fox will need to infiltrate the castle with his men. The only way is a secret underground passage, and the only key lies with the new king Roderick. A man is needed on the inside, and the bumbling coward Hubert Hawkins (Danny Kaye) is just the man for the job. Impersonating Roderick's new court jester Giacomo, Hubert gains entry to the court. But getting in is only the beginning. Hubert will have to navigate many perils, including a witch, an iron-willed princess, a case of mistaken identity, and a jousting tourney to the death, in order to make it out alive.
This film is an exemplary model of a lovingly crafted spoof. Writer/directors Melvin Frank and Norman Panama lampoon the high adventure Robin Hood genre made famous by Errol Flynn. But far from a heartless and biting parody, The Court Jester never forgets its source material. It is as much a part of high adventure film as it is a spoof of it. There is plenty of swordplay, intrigue, romance, and murder to get you in the spirit. And then when you're into the swing of things, Danny Kaye comes along and throws you a slapstick curveball that has you laughing your ass off.
Kaye, a master of song and lyrical tongue-twisters, serves up a heaping portion here, including the hypnotically catchy "Maladjusted Jester" and the famous Pellet with the Poison bit. Kaye is sensational as Hubert/Giacomo, a kind of bumbling, funnier, livelier precursor to Kramer from "Seinfeld". Very solid performances from Cecil Parker (King Roderick), Basil Rathbone (the odious and unctuous Ravenhurst, King's councillor), and Angela Lansbury (the steely-eyed and disturbingly attractive Princess Gwendolyn) round out the film.
Seriously, what's not to love about a movie featuring an army of little people, for gods sakes? Interestingly, one can see some very suspicious similarities between The Court Jester and Monty Python and the Holy Grail (1975). These similarities are a little too suspicious to be coincidental, I think. Messieurs Chapman, Cleese, Idle, Jones, and Palin must have been fans of this film growing up.
So is The Court Jester a kids flick? I would say emphatically no, but at the same time, I think many children would enjoy it, so by all means, make a family night out of it. You won't be disappointed. High energy, great music, slapstick routines, and more subtle comedy; this is a really fun watch.
Storyline & plot: 8/10
Cinematography & effects: 7/10
Music & mood: 9/10
Performances: 9/10
The Reverend says: 8/10
Tuesday, August 18, 2009
One Crazy Summer
Let me say, as far as summers go, I've seen crazier. In fact, I think I've lived crazier. I guess crazy is relative. I'd say the hijinks of Hoops McCann (John Cusack), Cassandra (Demi Moore), and the Stork twins (Bobcat Goldthwait & Tom Villard) in One Crazy Summer (1986) are more silly, goofy, wacky, or zany. Yeah, I like zany. You don't see zany used enough in movie titles. One Zany Summer. Yeah, I guess it's a little clunky. Beats It's a Zany Zany Zany Zany World, though. Anyway, I don't think I'd go as far as crazy. But, you know, it's not a bad film, it's got a few laughs, and it's always good to see John Cusack in something that doesn't suck. Because damn if his track record hasn't been spotty of late.
Hoops (ironically named, since he can't play basketball worth a shit) has just graduated high school in, wait for it.... Generic, NY. Yep, instead of make up some town, director Savage Steve Holland goes straight for the ironic sucker punch with Generic, NY. Clever. I like it. Anyway, back to Hoops. He's trying to get into art school, and his entrance exam requires he write and illustrate a love story. Hoops has got til the end of the summer to draw his masterpiece, starring a frumpy rhinoceros looking for love, but continually foiled by evil little bunnies. The animations (by Holland himself) serve as interludes along our journey with Hoops, who decides to relax on Nantucket at the bidding of his friend George (Joel Murray). But it seems like relaxation is the last thing he'll get. On the way to Nantucket, George and Hoops pick up Cassandra, on the run from a gang of bikers, and headed to her grandfather's funeral on the island. Now Hoops has got to help Cassandra raise enough money to pay the mortgage on her grandfather's land, or the greedy Beckerstead clan will snatch it up to make way for a condo development.
The plight of the little guys fighting to keep their land against corporate development is as old as film itself and quite a bit older. Holland makes no attempt to say something deep on the subject, but rather uses it as a plot device to ultimately pit Hoops and his friends against the devious Beckersteads in the annual Nantucket regatta. And what's a regatta without an '80s music montage about friends fixing up an old boat? That's classy. And then there's Bobcat Goldthwait. Man, that guy must be really hard to work with. Also really hard not to punch in the face. He's about 80% annoyingly growling psycho in this film. The other 20% of the time he's actually funny, you know, in an Ace Ventura physical comedy sort of way. The highlight is an over-the-top extended Godzilla parody, as Goldthwait stumbles around, trapped in a lizard monster costume. Hey, it's not highbrow comedy or anything, but it's not bad.
Unfortunately, there is absolutely zero chemistry between Moore and Cusack, so the romance (the central theme of the movie, remember?) kinda fizzles. Also, Moore's character is some kind of pseudo-hippie and she goes the entire movie with these horribly unattractive, greasy looking braids all in her hair. It's really quite repulsive. Oh yeah, so's her voice, which is featured in a couple of terrible bar songs (Cassandra is some sort of singer, apparently, though you wouldn't know it from her screeching voice).
Basically, this is a fun summer movie, something you could make fun of in a group setting. It's movie fluff, but it never pretends to be anything else.
Storyline & plot: 4/10
Cinematography & effects: 6/10
Music & mood: 5/10
Performances: 6/10
The Reverend says: 5/10
Hoops (ironically named, since he can't play basketball worth a shit) has just graduated high school in, wait for it.... Generic, NY. Yep, instead of make up some town, director Savage Steve Holland goes straight for the ironic sucker punch with Generic, NY. Clever. I like it. Anyway, back to Hoops. He's trying to get into art school, and his entrance exam requires he write and illustrate a love story. Hoops has got til the end of the summer to draw his masterpiece, starring a frumpy rhinoceros looking for love, but continually foiled by evil little bunnies. The animations (by Holland himself) serve as interludes along our journey with Hoops, who decides to relax on Nantucket at the bidding of his friend George (Joel Murray). But it seems like relaxation is the last thing he'll get. On the way to Nantucket, George and Hoops pick up Cassandra, on the run from a gang of bikers, and headed to her grandfather's funeral on the island. Now Hoops has got to help Cassandra raise enough money to pay the mortgage on her grandfather's land, or the greedy Beckerstead clan will snatch it up to make way for a condo development.
The plight of the little guys fighting to keep their land against corporate development is as old as film itself and quite a bit older. Holland makes no attempt to say something deep on the subject, but rather uses it as a plot device to ultimately pit Hoops and his friends against the devious Beckersteads in the annual Nantucket regatta. And what's a regatta without an '80s music montage about friends fixing up an old boat? That's classy. And then there's Bobcat Goldthwait. Man, that guy must be really hard to work with. Also really hard not to punch in the face. He's about 80% annoyingly growling psycho in this film. The other 20% of the time he's actually funny, you know, in an Ace Ventura physical comedy sort of way. The highlight is an over-the-top extended Godzilla parody, as Goldthwait stumbles around, trapped in a lizard monster costume. Hey, it's not highbrow comedy or anything, but it's not bad.
Unfortunately, there is absolutely zero chemistry between Moore and Cusack, so the romance (the central theme of the movie, remember?) kinda fizzles. Also, Moore's character is some kind of pseudo-hippie and she goes the entire movie with these horribly unattractive, greasy looking braids all in her hair. It's really quite repulsive. Oh yeah, so's her voice, which is featured in a couple of terrible bar songs (Cassandra is some sort of singer, apparently, though you wouldn't know it from her screeching voice).
Basically, this is a fun summer movie, something you could make fun of in a group setting. It's movie fluff, but it never pretends to be anything else.
Storyline & plot: 4/10
Cinematography & effects: 6/10
Music & mood: 5/10
Performances: 6/10
The Reverend says: 5/10
Death of a Ghost Hunter
I was very pleasantly surprised with the quality of Sean Tretta's Death of a Ghost Hunter (2007). From what I'd heard, it was a standard b-grade horror. Well, the b-horror nametag is true as far as it goes, but the production values were imaginative and polished, hinting at a higher quality film. In fact, the only things that really ground this film in the b-grade are the sub-par acting and poorly written dialogue. Our heroine is the only one who doesn't appear to be reading off of cue cards, and even she gets tripped up trying to pull off the awkward lines the writers are feeding her. But the story is otherwise solid, and actually scary at times.
The film opens with some backstory, grainily filmed and "aged" to give it the appearance of "file footage." We learn of the brutal murder of the Masterson family in Queen Creek, AZ (a suburb of Phoenix) in 1982. I initially thought this to be a real-life case, half remembered from my childhood in Phoenix. Turns out, the Masterson family of DoaGH is loosely based on a real life and much more recognizable family, the DeFeos of Amityville, NY. Fast forward 25 years. The nephew of the murdered Masterson patriarch has recently inherited the estate, including the ill-fated house in Queen Creek. With rumors of a haunting surrounding the property, the nephew contracts a crew to investigate, including paranormal investigator Carter Simms, local reporter Yvette Sandoval, videographer Colin Green, and a "spiritual advisor", the volatile Mary Young. Far from being a ghost chaser, Carter has spent her life debunking purported hauntings, but she's about to encounter something she was not completely prepared for: an actual paranormal experience. As the days and terrifying nights tick by in the Masterson house, the crew will have to try and figure out what exactly is going on in the house, what really happened to the Mastersons 25 years before, and what terrible secret their colleague Mary Young is harboring. It's a safe bet they won't all make it out alive, and the Masterson house will claim more victims.
DoaGH takes a cue from The Blair Witch Project (1999), employing a somewhat mockumentary style. It's also set up like an extended version of any of a myriad of ghost hunting shows on cable television, complete with voice-over narration and title screens indicating the day and time at key intervals. For the first ten minutes or so, the style and tempo of the film is incredibly annoying and I feared it would be much more like ghost hunter shows, which I personally think are extremely boring for the most part. But once the action of the film heats up, and the audience is immersed in the unfolding history of the Masterson house, the film settles into a comfortable and entertaining groove. The bulk of the movie reminds me more than anything of Brad Anderson's monumentally creepy and underappreciated Session 9 (2001), in its quietly lingering establishing shots, in its subtle hints into the history of place, in its accelerating episodic tempo, and in its chilling score and periodic explosions of sound. Considering I hold Session 9 in very high regard as one of the greatest horror movies of all time, this speaks well for DoaGH.
If you enjoyed Blair Witch (or even if you just liked the premise), or are awesome enough to have seen and enjoyed Session 9, and you don't mind a little sub-par acting, I think you could really get into this film. I sure did.
Storyline & plot: 7/10
Cinematography & effects: 7/10
Music & mood: 8/10
Performances: 4/10
The Reverend says: 7/10
The film opens with some backstory, grainily filmed and "aged" to give it the appearance of "file footage." We learn of the brutal murder of the Masterson family in Queen Creek, AZ (a suburb of Phoenix) in 1982. I initially thought this to be a real-life case, half remembered from my childhood in Phoenix. Turns out, the Masterson family of DoaGH is loosely based on a real life and much more recognizable family, the DeFeos of Amityville, NY. Fast forward 25 years. The nephew of the murdered Masterson patriarch has recently inherited the estate, including the ill-fated house in Queen Creek. With rumors of a haunting surrounding the property, the nephew contracts a crew to investigate, including paranormal investigator Carter Simms, local reporter Yvette Sandoval, videographer Colin Green, and a "spiritual advisor", the volatile Mary Young. Far from being a ghost chaser, Carter has spent her life debunking purported hauntings, but she's about to encounter something she was not completely prepared for: an actual paranormal experience. As the days and terrifying nights tick by in the Masterson house, the crew will have to try and figure out what exactly is going on in the house, what really happened to the Mastersons 25 years before, and what terrible secret their colleague Mary Young is harboring. It's a safe bet they won't all make it out alive, and the Masterson house will claim more victims.
DoaGH takes a cue from The Blair Witch Project (1999), employing a somewhat mockumentary style. It's also set up like an extended version of any of a myriad of ghost hunting shows on cable television, complete with voice-over narration and title screens indicating the day and time at key intervals. For the first ten minutes or so, the style and tempo of the film is incredibly annoying and I feared it would be much more like ghost hunter shows, which I personally think are extremely boring for the most part. But once the action of the film heats up, and the audience is immersed in the unfolding history of the Masterson house, the film settles into a comfortable and entertaining groove. The bulk of the movie reminds me more than anything of Brad Anderson's monumentally creepy and underappreciated Session 9 (2001), in its quietly lingering establishing shots, in its subtle hints into the history of place, in its accelerating episodic tempo, and in its chilling score and periodic explosions of sound. Considering I hold Session 9 in very high regard as one of the greatest horror movies of all time, this speaks well for DoaGH.
If you enjoyed Blair Witch (or even if you just liked the premise), or are awesome enough to have seen and enjoyed Session 9, and you don't mind a little sub-par acting, I think you could really get into this film. I sure did.
Storyline & plot: 7/10
Cinematography & effects: 7/10
Music & mood: 8/10
Performances: 4/10
The Reverend says: 7/10
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