shinolah Reviews

Willard (2003)

mind-blowing romance film

[18 March 2003]

I saw willard at the AMC Kanata outside of Ottawa, which is a chain theatre (I think the actual auditorium where I saw the movie previously showcased that talking kangaroo movie for adults). I can't entirely express my gratitude to the filmmakers for first placing Crispin in a lead role. Haven't seen that since 'Little Noises'. Secondly, a relatively mainstream film - not since Back to the Future has he been so prominent in a blockbuster (his performance in Charlie's Angels saved the film in my opinion, but he has only 6 minutes of screen-time)

once more: I saw this relatively big-budget movie, with Crispin Glover IN THE LEAD, in a chain movie theatre! I mean how funny is that. It's like seeing a Tarkovsky or Bresson film in Blockbuster's 'recommended' section.

I've been a Crispin Glover fan for years and to no surprise he gave another brilliant performance this time. Later that night my friend and I listened to a Crispin Hellion Glover album and marveled again at his cover of 'these boots are made for walking', delivered in a gut-wrenching whine somewhere between apology and a slammed door.

Looking at Anthony Perkins for contrasts/comparisons to Glover's willard is not the place to start. If you need it, Willard is more akin to The Young Poisoner's Handbook, Dead Alive (or Braindead in the UK), The Birdman of Alcatraz, and yourself. Glover's performance is so profoundly human it's uncanny. He's a pre-lingual actor; the body language is the key, and also, like good jazz, the choice of notes, or words. An emotionally arrested man befriended by rats, berated by his mother and boss, asexual. - how would you portray him? With lots and lots of unnecessary exposition? No, you'd keep the mystique.

R. Lee Ermy is hilarious (anyone who didn't laugh at his brief disgust looking at a fat housewife on the 'married couple' nudist website is dead inside), the art direction was flawless, great score, and, by the way, the pacing is perfect. I wasn't bored for a minute. There's something to be said for patience, my man. MTV kids find explosions boring nowadays.

From the brilliant animated opening credit sequence to Glover's haunting rendition of 'Ben' in the closing credits I was pinned to the screen. Morgan is promising - great use of pans and dollies and a subtle crane.

a 9 from me. A masterpiece, like most Glover performances, that will be unappreciated in its time.

The Stand (1994)

Maybe I don't Get It

[7/10 · 27 December 2002]

I posted a comment about the stand a year ago and take back most of it, having finished the book just last week. I was too complimentary.

Um. I guess I'm struggling with the idea of a broad survey of armageddon and whether or not the scope chosen by the novel is actually the right way to go about it in the first place. The book is totally engaging - you start imagining how it could play out in a movie. It would have to be 35mm, seen on the big screen, and it would have to be a trilogy with each part about three hours. The writer is American, very American judging by his obvious affinity for Steinbeck and rock and roll and cars and other cultural references. I think my favourite armageddon film is probably 'The Hole', which is a Taiwanese film. Small scale - really only two characters (everyone in their country has fled and their neighbourhood is pretty much empty ): a raving drunk and a pack-rat who lives below him. They watch eachother through a hole in his floor / her ceiling. Brilliant, hilarious, dark stuff.

good parts in the tv movie 'the stand' in my opinion: Harold's fingernails breaking the skin of his palm after he's discovered fran and stu.

• the shot on the highway where nick and tom ride their bikes against the backdrop of a beautiful sky - tom swerving side to side like a child.

• ralph and lloyd and the rat-man are well-cast.

• the opening montage with 'dont fear the reaper' - the montage of the appliances coming back to life after the power kicks back on. - the art direction of tom's house and town

BAD THINGS (well, the down-right laughable things) - the terrible blocking in Nick's fight scene on the highway. It's like they were just waiting to react to the hits. - the digital effects look like they were designed by a community college student (especially the Flagg bits, but especially when he walks thru the fire) but maybe thats because it's 1994. - Nick's expression as he hold's Tom's hand in the national anthem sequence. - The score is just lame. Sorry, I know that everyone involved in the project and many fans of the series love it, but i guess i imagined a lot more silence. The score is like a bad version of Cooder.

• I dont like fran s a character in general, but what little i did like about her was just vacuumed out by molly ringwald's mediocrity. some of the looks she gives just make me want to shake to see if she'll come out of hypnosis.

If i was gonna make the film it'd be a whole lot more pretentious, but i'd take the criticism just to make an adaptation that actually, y'know, had heart and subtlety and looked like thought went into it as opposed to just a process of avoidance. Avoidance of natural locations, of curse words, of expensive actors, of sets (oh man theyre bad - especially the farm). - the soap-opera acting and general tv-drama feel.

Here's a question: was HBO not an option?

I don't understand how the book's writer [altho i find the book incredible at times in both scope and character, i think it loses steam toward the end (the 'hand of god' stuff from revelations is just downright goofy in both the book and the mini - "...do you see it? The hand of God!")] could have sold himself out like this. I just don't think his characters and atmosphere translate well into film. Good evidence: his best adaptations (the shining, stand by me, misery, carrie, christine) are written by other people, sometimes not even fans of King's. They take the powerful parts of his novels to heart and improve upon their weaknesses. King himself and the world of film simply don't mix. The one film he directed sucked beyond belief, he's a terrible actor and a pretty bad screenwriter.

The Stand (1994)

thin line between tv-excellence and film-mediocrity

[7/10 · 12 November 2001]

Not fair on my part that I've only read a few hundred pages of the book; I watched the stand when it aired originally - I was 13 or so and fell in love with Rob Lowe as Nick Andros; the most sympathetic character I'd been exposed to at that point in tv culture caused me to stop enjoying Parker Lewis Can't Lose because *spoiler ahead* Nemic's character had something to do with his demise in the film.

I re-watched it again on cable last month. What an over-wrought, simplistic, under-directed, cornball marathon which still bears King's name. Most performances were decent, with extra credit going to Sinise as the archetypal American hero, Sheridan as a laughable yet reasonable theological villain - chances are the devil looks like a New-Country sensation. Rob Lowe and Nemic were very respectable as two distinctly marginal outcasts. Ringwald - well, she - um. I have an 80s John Hughes fetish like every honest film geek but hers was a weak, whiney, ridiculous role. Maybe the character is equally obnoxious in the book I wouldn't know.

The dialogue and acting is at times laughable, (Nick during the first cornfield segment - pontifically gesturing his neck and smiling gayly - "I can hear! I can talk!" caused me to burst out laughing) and the ridiculous hokum-accents at the beginning of the film over Campion's intercom when the virus is released are just idiotic. It angers you, when the subject matter and characters are intriguing - you want to step-in and direct parts yourself.

There are moments of brilliance, however. The Flu Buddy ad for instance, with the miscegenated black man breakdancing and high-fiving an animated cold remedy as corporate america's tonic for an impending armageddon. I also like the fact that Larry's hit song 'Can You Dig Your Man?' is horrible, equipped with lyrics so infectious everyone from college professors to the devil are heard to recite them.

It's good, clean all-american fun. But, y'know, so is deer hunting apparently. Watch it twice with two different moods and you'll see two different films. If you approach it unbiasedly (not having read the book, not having experienced the cult following) - you'll either disregard the scale and forget what the miniseries offers or you'll truly feel enlightened. If you saw the film when it first aired (especially if you were young) and are seeing it again, you'll appreciate it for nostalgic value and find it hard to disregard, no matter how slick the criticism.

It's goofy - but its goofiness becomes infectious - I've spent worser times with the television, but I've spent far better with film.

Backbeat (1994)

Pure garage raunch

[8/10 · 12 June 2001]

The film is a marvel. The only evidence of post-fame Beatles nostalgia that doesn't seek to cash-out. It is no less than a kick-ass rock n' roll film, with deft photography, powerful direction and an incredibly hard garage soundtrack. Recommended for fans of garage raunch and pre-invasion british blues.

Instinct (1999)

made by simpletons, directed at simpletons

[1/10 · 13 May 2001]

Films like this are what is wrong with mainstream cinema. It was a contrived re-mixing of Gorillas in the Mist, The Shawshank Redemption and Dead Poets Society. The script seemed to have been written on a chalkboard - interchanging cliche after cliche though lacking a satirical or retroactive temperament. I'm not exaggerating - there were so many overt film references it seemed like a parody. The actors were designated by their collective wallet, not heart or mind, and the direction was simplistic. And you people gave 'Julien Donkey-Boy' a 4.5? Clearly the lesson remains: 'give us what we want' because the alternative is just too horrifying.

It's this type of film, and this type of rampant commercialism that seeks to destroy the craft of film art, just as disco had to rock and roll in the 70s. See this film and continue to line studio-pockets...just don't maintain a pretense of superiority over those of us who give a damn.

Friday the 13th: A New Beginning (1985)

Jason preoccupied - Charles Bronson fills in

[16 August 2000]

Hmmm. Wow. I saw the series for a reason - well I mean, we all did. We still do. I was a kid when my horror movie fixation kicked in - it ended the day I saw Carol Reed's 'The Third Man' when I was 16. Once in a while I take a break from the classics (before all creativity and humanist exploration in cinema died), but still like to revisit my youth. The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (still a great, groundbreaking and comparably unbrutal thriller), The Toolbox Murders, Dolls, the Nightmare sequels, Truth or Dare (absolutely morbid, disturbing horror which my mom wouldn't let me watch), etc.

In 2000, I arrive back at Jason. They're showing a day-to-day marathon of the main 8 films (witholding the truly forgettable and pointless 'Jason goes to Hell'). I am at 5, going on 6 tomorrow night.

THE MASK Ok...I have done a little research. I actually called Steve Miner at his home and we talked for a few minutes. I asked him how the mask invent came about. It was, as I had figured, a marketing tool. A byproduct of the unseen yet ubiquitous boogie man, used to set Jason apart from Michael and Freddy. The mystery and malice was, after part one and the first sequel, devleoping a modestly popular thriller franchise. The mask set him apart. Ok - my larger question. In part four, after Feldman's turns a bit kooky and gives it to Jason, the mask drops off - foreshadowing 101 people - but did we expect the next sequel to be a simple, low-budget 'Death Wish' meets 'Toolbox Murders', no-Jason hybrid? Nope. Awful awful. If the franchise was truly strong (so much so that 'the mask' which only appeared for twenty minutes in part 3 actually opened part four), popularized by the masked man, why rid of him so early? 6 is unlike the others - it is gruesome, humourless and intense. I anticipate it Friday night. I'll order a pizza and have a beer.

SEQUELS None of it is art - any unmotivated usage of violence or nudity witholding a satirical nature is plain idiotic and wrong - they stand the test of time for the series portrayal of characters who are newly born - who fail to realize you cannot keep headlights on for an hour so you can see one another in a roadside conversation and expect the car to run smoothly. The jalopy factor: it's featured in the first three. So are the CU shots of teenaged girls' butts, skinny dipping, twigs snapping, the "ch-ch-ch-ha-ha-ha" leit

motif, the stock goof, the stock slut, the stock hero, the stock heroine, the potential killer who turns out to be the goof or the hero sneaking up, the stock stoner or fatass (usually the goof). It's all good fun.

I have difficulty watching films that are genuinely awful for the expressed purpose of laughing at them because they are awful. Ed Wood taught me a valuable lesson: critics and audiences with overwrought expectations cause filmmakers with genuine talent to cringe - they cause untalented filmmakers to cry. Ed Wood was a passionate man, a devoted filmmaker and a kind soul. He had no talent. His films ARE laughable - so were fat kids, gay kids and black kids in school way back when, right? Is it fair? You say 'that film sucked' you are basically saying 'this man/woman has no business making films', ergo he/she is worthless. Can you imagine anything more humiliating than sitting in a movie theatre with your parents - wife, girlfriend, kids, brother, whatever...and hearing the audience laugh at drama or take comedy seriously? Your guts churning, self-doubt now engratiating. It is horrible. Rene Clair often insisted that his films play to empty theatres. Amen, brother. I don't fully agree but I still smile when people tell me the story of him kicking his audience out.

In closing - Friday 5 god-awful; the series is fun and mindlessly entertaining; smart people can faithfully watch this 'true' filmmaking before their eyes. Why? Because, much like the scorpion on the frog's back, it knows its nature - it reflects itself perfectly. The filmmakers may well be idiots, with the exception of Mr. Miner who seems quite learned (We talked about Godard and Chris Marker for a bit). The audience who does not know the filmmaker in question, however, are those who aren't caught up in every element of the film's production - they are the ones who have 'no idea'.

My permanent motto: do not criticize a film, a song, a book, a painting until you produce one.

Variety Lights (1950)

Reassuringly simple story of love, destiny...show business?

[6/10 · 11 June 1999]

In approaching any film of Fellini's, it is important not to clump his style in the same field of other European 'arthouse' filmmakers such as Bergman, Godard, Antonioni or even Tarkovsky.

From what I understand after viewing a few of his films [namely 'La Strada', 'La Dolce Vita', 'Nights of Cabiria' and now 'Variety Lights'] Fellini draws deceptively simple metaphors and contexts from banal characters often at times, for instance Quinn as the strongman in "La Strada" who exploits the resources and emotions of a simple-minded farm girl and then finds his life imbued with a terrible guilt upon hearing of her death. He knows now that physical strength can no longer be a shield that he wields when life throws him the challenge of reaching out and caring. This is all delicately displayed by Fellini who basically draws these characters with very modest lives and shows their gradual moral breakdown. Unlike Bergman who will use intense, ambiguous and overtly intellectual dialogue showing a couples' slow disintegration, or Antonioni who will use a pantomimed tennis match to illustrate the uncertainty of an artist's future, Fellini simply gives us a glimpse into a common person's vocation and relates it to a much broader social and existential complex. I consider his early work to be representative of modern day filmmakers with a similar style such as Hal Hartley and Jim Jarmusch.

In "Variety Lights" we are given a tale of small-time musicians, dancers, singers, and one naive but well-meaning owner who will do anything to get ahead in life and make his troupe of entertainers an instant success, eventually turning to the wrong people for assistance. This is all basically the back-drop of the owner's floundering marriage, which basically comes to a screeching halt near the end when he begs her for money to take another stab at the show once he's broke. The wife becomes less an endearing necessity of one man's livelihood and more an impetulant cashcow of sorts.

The story is brilliantly written and touching and not overwrought in pretentious 'arthouse' silliness. This is why Antonioni ran out of steam shortly after "Blowup", he began to choke on his own tedious style. "Variety Lights" is not among Fellini's best films but there is nothing shameful about this, his directorial debut.

Apparently Fellini fell into the mix of more ambiguous tones toward the mid-60's, which is fine. I'm all for experimentation so long as it maintains the delicate balance between art and bloated ambiguity.

All I Want for Christmas Is a Gang Bang (1994 Video)

Among the most original porn titles of the 1990s

[15 May 1999]

Throw away every misconception you have about the porn industry and its films; instead focus on the fun, the satire and the lust implicit in most of John T. Bone's work, which addresses modern, more racy takes on early America classics and pre-set ideals.

Not being a porn-expert, but a film sociologist in training, I recommend these films not because I agree with their societal message or the content itself, but the concept of American lore as harbouring sexual tension shines through with sharp originality and wit. I can't wait for John T. Bone's send-up of The Wizard of Oz, because I'm sure he's thought it over.

All I Want For Christmas...deals mainly with this very concept, the systematic deconstruction of American identity as being holier than thou; Bone shows the audience that in each and every proper citizen there is someone who finds the concept of a more sensual take on Christmas both a turn on, and ultimately hilarious.

These film makers are not stupid, they merely have more courage than you and I to address the 'radical impulse' of female sexuality without seeming hypocritical in the process, as opposed to something like 1997's "Wild Things" which gave you softcore sexuality but left the audience hostile by perpetuating a tease phenomenon which is far more dangerous an ideal than that which most porn explores; the same concept is implicit in most of these recent "teen appeal" films.

Shadows (1958)

Without a doubt among the most influential of American films

[7/10 · 15 May 1999]

What is there to say about an anti-establishment film that was produced in a time of such colourless void, social indifference and authoritarian contentment. Cassevettes first major independent film was not an instant box office success and still has not received the critical attention it deserves. I draw comparisons to this wave of American independent projects consisting of such 'Beat' filmmakers as Robert Frank and Harry Smith with the burgeoning scene emerging in Paris in the late 1950's known as the French new wave.

They discussed poetry and philosophy and vulnerability at a time when the rest of the culture was obsessed with rediscovering American cultural supremacy; even at this stage this peculiar, highly spontaneous brand of filmmaking fought against the establishment of such political lexicons and bigots that held the development of the arts in check in the mid twentieth century.

Cassevettes film examines race relations and portrays man as weak in the face of love because we, as a culture, are blinded by our own race bias and prejudice. The great element to most of Cassevettes work is that his films have almost a reversal minimalist effect; a mental reaction is evoked through subtle character relations, not so much imagery. This is why his work seems to linger because he takes a more intimate approach to defining charcters that rely less heavily on explicit actions and more upon interpretation.

Although my favourite Cassevettes film is 'Husbands', this one is his most important.

All I Want for Christmas Is a Gang Bang (1994 Video)

the hottest Chong video ever

[9 May 1999]

Gentleman and ladies, we have entered the mecca of porn vids. Director John T. Bone and his bathing Asian beauty Ms. Chong deliver a sendup of conventional yule tide tales with this gangbang fiasco. It is a sexual tour de force for Chong, with a plethora of DP's and even a sensational DAP that kept me awake hours after the tape ended. Besides the steamy action, what really grabbed my attention and arousal was the theme, imagine the concept of a santa's workshop gangbang! Priceless! And I hear Bone has even done a film set in a school, called Straight A's which is next on my to see list. He is a visionary, pumping out sizzling hardcore that is to the porn world what Cassevettes was to the mainstream world. He is downright, in your face, showing you what you want by giving indication as to what we are; first and foremost -- pleasure seekers.