The world of exploitation film ripped open and laid raw for you to experience. From 70's grindhouse to current underground, it is all here. So ripe you can practically smell it.
BEYOND THE BLACK RAINBOW (2012) D. Panos Cosmatos Magnet Releasing 2.35 This experimental, sci-fi, horror is a visual triumph but on a plot level it is completely confounding. Which I think is all part of the design of the piece. But that makes it damn hard to get through at times.
The film opens with a commercial for the ABORIA INSTITUTE for happiness and wellness. The commercial has Dr. Barry Nyle (Michael Rogers) talking directly to the camera about the new and exciting techniques the place has to offer. It sounds like a new age getaway camp for those needing to run from theirs problems. But when we enter the actual institute it is something else entirely. A freakishly red lit nightmare hospital that seems to only have one patient, the teenaged Elena (Eva Allen). Dr. Nyle is clearly obsessed with Elena and her so called "recovery" constantly lording over her and tormenting her psyche with questions about her dead mother. Dr. Nyles is unhappy at home, distanced from his wife Rosemary, so the work seems to be all he has. As the movie goes on we discover the institute has a lot more going on, such as what appears to be android sentinels guarding secret rooms, and experimentation that reveals that Elena is a telepath, able to explode people when pushed. The movie takes a hard left turn (from already being way left of center) when we see a flashback of the doctor and the creator of the institute Dr. Aboria in some sort of personal destruction/recreation ritual. This is when we realize Dr. Nyles is all together very different from what we thought. Much more dangerous and deadly and probably not even human.
The movie is all about style with locations bathed in red light, faced bathed in blue or yellow. Everyone moves at half speed, sometimes even slower and the music is pulsing and repetitive like old techno or house music. It all adds up to a beautiful to look at film that works like a trance in action. I bet seeing this on the big screen was quite an experience. But watching it on TV only served to make me nod out a few times over.
BEYOND THE BLACK RAINBOW is worth watching due to the sheer uniqueness of it, but it isn't going to convince you to visit it a second time, even if it probably takes the second viewing to comprehend all of it.
CLASS OF 1999 (1989) D. MARK LESTER Artisan Full Frame (Park of the Lions Gate Horror 8 movie Multi-pack)
Quite of a few years after the success of CLASS OF 1984 director Mark Lester went back to high school to make this much more science-fiction tinged psuedo sequel. Taking a lot of ques from the then recent hits ROBOCOP and THE TERMINATOR, lester ramps up the action and special effects to create a goofy, but very satisfying afternoon time waster.
The film opens in the title year (that seemed far off in 1989); youth gangs have run rampant in society. With violence so bad that whole pieces of the cities have been related to "no-reply zones" by the cops, leaving the gangs to rule as they see fit. But one high school is trying to not take it lying down and team up with government corporation to use "experimental" teachers (John Vernon, Patrick Kilpatric, and Pam Grier). Actually combat mode androids that are more bloodthirsty than the kids they are fighting. Our hero Cody, played by Bradley Gregg is a kid just getter of of jail and trying to go back to school. But his friends in the gang all consider him a sell out, the rival gang want to kill him, his little brother is joining the gang and best friend is a junked up dope addict looking for a bad way out. He has also fallen for the pretty daughter (Traci Lind who later dropped the "D" from her name to be just Traci Lin) of the principal (Maclom Macdowell). But all of that will become back burner material when he runs afoul of the Teaching Droids who have started their own very violent programming. The movie is primarily an action flick with several well mounted shootouts, fist fights, car crash and the F/X heavy finale where the androids dispose of their limbs to have heavy artillery hiding within. The finale has these heavily armed robots fighting the teenage gangs on motorcycles in the hall of the school. Their is some impressive explosions, motorcycle stunts and some really splashy gore including one teen who is literally torn in half.
When I saw this in the theater in the fall of 1989 I had a lot of fun with it, enjoying the stunts and grue. Watching it now, over twenty years later it is amusing how dated the film feels due to the costumes, language and special effects. It was still kind of low rent back then, but pretty impressive for the really tight budget. Now it is hard to look past Bradley Greg's Half jacket that no self respecting gay club kid would wear. Or Stacey Keach (who plays the man behind the cyborgs) and his white rat-tail buzz cut. The movie becomes a bit more campy than I am sure was intended. Though a lot of it is INTENTIONALLY campy.
ALIEN FROM THE DEEP (1989) D.Antonio Margheriti (Anthony Dawson) One 7 Movies Full Frame 1:33 92 Minutes
This Italian genre mish-mash is basically advertised in the artwork as an ALIENS rip off, but it is actually just barely that, yet in reality is so, so much more. A Johnny come late in the Alien falls to Earth sub-genre by 1989, with by that year what would be primitive special effects, this movie has a whole lot to love. It it had been made even ten years earlier I could imagine it playing drive-in double bills, or urban theater afternoon matinees for quite some time. This is the exact kind of movie I used to sit glued to cable TV mid-day and watch while playing with my toys as a kid. Movies like SPACE RAIDERS, YOR THE HUNTER FROM THE FUTURE (also directed by Margheriti) or Luigi Cozzi’s really shitty, but terribly entertaining HERCULES movies. If I had seen ALIEN FROM THE DEEP at ten years old it would have been on of my favorite movies of that year. But by 1989 I was about to enter college. I was well aware of so bad their good movies and would have loved it for different reasons.
"Maam I resent you saying I dress like Wil Wheaton. You need to put some clothes on before I throw you off my boat!"
Pretty Marina Giulia Cavalli stars as Jane a Greenpeace investigator heading to a remote island in tow with her lovelorn and trusty cameraman Lee (Robert Marius) (who only shoots with a VHS camera!) to look for the shady doings of corporate criminals E-Chem headed by baddy Charles Napier. Turns out these dunderheads have been dumping all their toxic waste into the local, very active volcano! Along the way they meet some local witch doctors and have some various jungle adventures. In fact the whole first half of the movie is an action/adventure movie about this couple trying to get the goods on E-Chem and evading capture. I kept checking the dvd box and wondering if I had been misled about this whole Alien/monster business.
"Goddammit! I used to work for Russ Meyer! I was around titties til Tuesday! How'd I end up on this helicopter with you?!"
Not that it isn’t entertaining and well handled. It all has a sort of ROMANCING THE STONE vibe going on as Jane meets Bob (Daniel Bosch) the local snake wrangle (wink wink!) who helps her out of a jam and into his heart. He gets a glimpse of her in his shirt after a shower and he is sucked into her whole scheme. Even the fact he keeps a pet cobra that roams free in his pad, doesn’t deter her from his wiley ways either. They play house while her friend Lee is being tortured for information by those evil E-Chem bastards!
"He's the "snakecharmer" hardy har har..."
Then finally about the 50 minute mark a meteor falls into the lake by the volcano and a monster crawls out into the water. The E-Chem scientist a kindly old man named Dr. Geoffries (Alan Collins) explains it came from space attracted to the power of the toxic waste and is using it to gain power and grow! See the movie threw you a curve ball! You thought some monster was going to be born out of the volcano or some prehistoric dinosaur or something! Nope! it came from space to stomp their asses! From here it gets right down to it, biting the head off a diver and burrowing into the ground heading towards the factory.
Jane and Bob are heading back to the factory because Lee hid a VHS tape of the toxic dumping there as well, so all is on a collision course for CRAZY! The creature is stopping along the way to pinch people in half with the giant claw or melt their face off with his radioactive touch, or slimy residue. All we see of the big guy for the most part is that big ass lobster claw bursting out of the ground or through walls until the big finale when he stands upright. He looks like a two story bio-mechanical car engine with lobster claws mixed with a transformer toy. Which is to say he looks FUCKING AWESOME.
"Beat this shit Michael Bay!!!"
A couple of other highlights include a character having his leg melted by radioactive goo while he still walks around, Dr. Geoffries running around with a huge retrofitted flame thrower, and best of all Jane having to be “decontaminated” from the monster goo, which means she ends up in a wet T-shirt and underwear for the entire climax of the movie. That’s some good thinking Right there. The effects are of the old school blowing up miniatures variety. Which adds a real charm to the proceedings as well.
For all the shooting and monster chomping and some splatter action, the movie is surprisingly non-offensive. The gore is not really lingered on, and there is no sex or nudity (wet T-shirt not withstanding). Only the occasional F-bombs really land this with the R-rating. Hell if I had kids I’d probably let them watch it. Like I said, if I saw this when I was ten years old I’d have loved this.
"Apparently the monster farts glass."
The DVD is sparse on extras, only a “image gallery” that is images from the actual film, and a grainy ass many generation away copy of the Italian credits sequence. I would have loved some interviews or even just a trailer. This is a full frame presentation but it seems like it may have been shot that way as it never feels like the frame is tight or missing information.
Overall quite and enjoyable pulp sci-fi flick that I feel no shame in recommending to fellow aficionados of this sort of thing.
On Saturday night I was finally back in town and decided to take in some classic drive in swill for the Halloween Horror Challenge.
THE GIANT GILA MONSTER (1959) D. Ray Kellog Public Domain Full Frame
This classic 50's monster mash is such a delight that I've totally fallen in love with it. For years I have seen clips of it on TV specials, horror hosts shows, compilation tapes, and Sci-fi, horror history documentaries, but never had gotten around to seeing the actual movie. It's the quintessential 50's drive in horror fare, with EVERYTHING a movie from that era needs to be definitive: dancing teenagers, fast cars, hillbillies and rednecks, a lovable town drunk, a town sheriff who is looking out for the kids, AND a teen hero who's a grease-monkey, father figure to his semi delinquent friends, and a wanna-be rock singer! He also takes care of his widowed mom and handicapped sister who can't walk due to her malformed legs. So he's just a swell guy all around, and even the big city disc jockey takes a shine to him after he saves the man's ass when he catches him drunk driving one afternoon. Instead of turning him into the police, our hero tows him into the shop to fix the fender bender he just had and let the fat bastard dry out. In fact, he's so squeaky clean/awesome that when he swipes the tires off a crime scene car the sheriff just looks the other way!
Frenchie does NOT seem to be enjoying chase's banjo ditty. in fact looks like a projectile vomit is on the way at any minute.
Then there is the Gila Monster itself. One of the greatest monster creations of all time. Whomever got the bright idea of just getting a regular Gila monster/lizard and plopping it down in miniature sets and making a movie around it was a freakin' genius. Seriously. I mean i can't account for how this movie played in 1959 and if audiences thought that shit looked realistic (to be fair the miniatures are pretty nice) but it's classic hilarity now. But even more than that, the Gila Monster is so damn cute, you can't hate him. The way he lurks around in the bushes watching the action from just off screen, sitting there blinking his lizard eye, just wanting to be loved. You feel for the big guy.
Just chilling behind some bushes, listening to Chase and the Sheriff chew the fat.
And he's smart, too. He knows when to knock a car full of obnoxious humping teens down a cliff and eat their asses, and when to hang back and just listen to the sheriff and his buddy talk about the crime scene at hand. It's not until the horrible singing at the barn party at the end that he freaks out and decides it is time to just eat the whole damn town.
Town Drunk, doing what he does best. getting ready to go for an evening drive.
That brings us to the highlight of the movie. No, not the awesome Gila Monster attack on the barn party, though that is pretty great. Nope, it's the middle of the movie out of nowhere full on song number from lead actor Don Sullivan called "Laugh Little Children," or as it has become known to fans, "The Mushroom Song". It happens right after the main character Chase has come home to find his girlfriend Frenchie has given his crippled little sister leg braces to finally walk. Now up until this point we nave never seen, nor heard mention of his little sister, her plight or her need for leg braces. In fact, we never knew she existed until now. But he walks in and this little girl gets up, tries to walk toward him, but falls down. She gets up again and walks a few steps and starts to fall again, but heroic Chase catches her. She gets all teary eyed over the fact that she practiced all day so she could have it together enough to impress him when he got home. We're trying to figure out if this is his illegitimate kid, or what? He whips out a handy banjo and starts singing a little tune to her about how a little "mushroom" tried to grow tall but couldn't and kids laughed at it. So the Lord said "laugh little children laugh". When he's finished, the girl, apparently his sister, says "laughing is important, isn't it?" to which he replies "I've never felt more like laughing than I do right now!"
"Alright! Five HUNDRED dollars right here and now and I will make sure Chase NEVER sings again!"
Yeah, that has got to make her feel a shitload better! And no, she doesn't manage to run away on her new leg braces when the Gila Monster comes after her, though she tries. I got the feeling the director hated this little girl. Especially after her close-up revealed she has a nasty mustache.
I'm not even gonna talk about the little man crush the sheriff seems to have on the lead character, or how the lead character practically sexually assaults a woman in a hallway that we discover in the next scene is his MOTHER! Sheesh!
"Well sheriff I can only get my arm about THIS FAR up there. can you deal with that?"
But I will talk about how the movie's explanation for the Gila Monster's size is simply that in Russia a baby was born at 30 pounds so giantism is a real thing. Maybe lots of minerals had been being dumped in the river from the old coal mine and made the Gila Monster get real big, because it happened to a baby in Russia, so it must be possible!
Awesome. That is all I have to say. Oh yeah in June it was the 50th anniversary of this classic!
And here to amuse you, or hurt your head, "The Mushroom Song"
The following review is an old one from my previous site. I was talking to my girlfriend about this movie last night about how both of us pretty much didn't like this movie and I wanted to dig up this old review to see what my thoughts had been about it. I actually was easier on it than I remembered. Though I still stand by my opinions on the negative comments, I do not even remember ANY of the positive things I mention, which is weird.
On with the show...
A.I. D. Steven Spielberg Dreamworks
I must state up front that if you plan to see this film then do not read this review until after. In the process of explaining my decision regarding this film’s worth I will give away major plot points and even the ending. Regardless of my opinion, you as an audience member deserve to make up your own minds and see a film with it being spoiled by a critic. So if you want to see A.I. stop reading now.
This much anticipated adaptation of Stanley Kubrick’s former project by his supposed buddy Steven Spielberg has polarized audiences from coast to coast. The film could easily be summed up with a new title of "DO ANDROIDS DREAM OF ELECTRIC TEDDY BEARS" as it shamelessly pulls plot ideas and situations from Phillip K. Dick’s story DO ANDROIDS DREAM OF ELECTIRC SLEEP which went on to become the seminal Sci-Fi film BLADE RUNNER.
For those who don’t know A.I. stands for Artificial Intelligence. The film is about a robot boy played by Haley Joel Osmett (of THE SIXTH SENSE). He is real in every way (well almost but we’ll get to that later). He is placed into a home of a family whose son has been in a coma for a long time and looks like he will not be coming home. The experiment is too see if human’s can learn to love something that is not human, and can it love them back.
The first 50 minutes of the film cover this quandary in the typical Spielberg fashion. Which is to dump the robot kid into as many jeopardizing situations as possible to pull at your heart strings. Actually interesting arguments such as whether or not it is a good idea to play god by creating an artificial person are left by the wayside so the film can be packed full of tearful interludes as the parent’s begin to fear the robot because he doesn’t understand their world. Essentially it is E.T. with a robot kid. Much is made early on about imprinting the robot kid’s memory with emotions. Only the Mother can do this and it is made very clear it is irreversible. The mother spends the first few minutes of her screen time appalled by the very idea of the child robot. But after spending a day with him annoying her she decides she does want to be his real Mommy and imprints him. No reason is given for her change of heart. She just does it to set the plot in motion. Almost immediately the Father begins to resent the little light box of a kid, even though it was his idea to bring the thing home and keep it in the first place. These are just examples of emotional inconsistencies that are present only to further the film into the area of forever flowing audience tears.
Next the child who was in the irreparable coma (the child we have not scene since the beginning of the film) is magically okay and moves back home. He immediately begins to destroy the family life the robot kid has made and instills the very easily planted seeds of dissent in the parents.
The climactic moment of the first act (the movie is very carefully structured in the Hollywood blockbuster acceptable three act screenplay) is the Mother abandoning the robot kid in the forest cause she simply cannot live with his robotic menace anymore. She loves him, but her real child is back, so it’s the highway for Haley the Roboboy.
The remainder of the film (nearly two hours) is the kid’s journey to get back home and to become a real boy just like Pinocchio (which is hammered so far into your skull that you want to go back in time and murder all involved with Pinocchio just so you never have to hear it referenced in the movie ever again!).
Then the movie really begins with roboboy’s journey to discover who he is and what being and Android is all about. But lets stop a minute and look at the first third of the movie. The crux of the rest of the film hinges on the idea that the kid wants to be reunited with his flesh parents and be a real boy. These are the same people who favored sending him back to the factory to be killed (the Dad wants that) and the Mom who can’t deal with the guilt of that act so SHE ABANDONS HIM! Its okay though because she can’t die he’s not a real boy! So as an audience we are supposed to take the next two hour journey with this character to find something that is pretty much reprehensible. The movie really could have taken a turn here and made some statements about child abuse and learning to be an adult. But it doesn’t.
Instead it becomes a typical action, sci-fi extravaganza that on a purely visual level is actually very entertaining. The next hour of the film sets up a very believable future full of sexual overload (though this is only hinted at really) and burnt out cites where destroying robots has become sport and competition. The scenes in the flesh fair (sort of Robot Gladiatorial challenges) are some of the best stuff Spielberg has done since RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK. Too bad we had to sit through not one but two faked death scenes of the robokid before getting there (and don’t worry there are more in the film to come!)
This is also where the film introduces Jude Law (who I find to be an immensely annoying screen presence anyway) as the Android sex machine who gets framed for murder in the second scene he is in. I’m sure in the original source material this character played an integral part, but not anymore. He is in the film to guide the kid around from point A to point B. The biggest reason he is in the film (and the reason he is framed for murder by characters we never meet again) is so there can be a climactic tear jerking scene where he is carted off to prison after befriending the kid. There is no reason what so ever for him to be a sex android in this final version of the film.
Here in lies the film’s biggest problems. Whenever a real issue with relevance or importance rears up Spielberg deflects it in his constant barrage of smaltz. Why bother telling a story that makes comments on child Abuse, the idea of Humans playing God, the inability of mankind to communicate emotionally and sexually, when you can have some kids throw the little robo-bastard in a pool so you think he might die. At least then you’ll gasp and maybe shed a tear in relief!
Once again do not read further if you intend to see the film!
In the third act the film literally bends time, space and reality to make sure the kid can be briefly reunited with his bitch flesh Mother. But this has to be the ultimate tear jerk moment, so instead of just letting the kid find his mother (cause then they would have to actually deal with some of the above issues mentioned) they jettison him into a future where he is found by Aliens who can clone his mother but she will only be alive for a day. That way they can spend a perfect day together, she can kick the bucket and everyone walks out bawling. Except it doesn’t work because the Mother has done such a heinous act in abandoning the kid that we feel no sympathy for her.
Is the movie terrible? No, it is not. As per usual with Spielberg’s work the design is breathtaking. The vision of the Future is still BLADE RUNNER light, but at least it is pretty to look at. The midsection of the film really picks up as it becomes a pure sci-fi movie by creating another world were new rules exist. Yet Spielberg sees fit to fill these moments with unneeded audience pleasing clutter that suck you right out of the movie such as the Dr. Know animated character voiced by Robin Williams. Or the convenient way the kid traps himself underwater for two thousand years just so he can be woke up and have his little happy moment without confronting the real issues at hand.
Ironically the best thing about the film is the one element that looks to be the most annoying at first glance. The walking, talking, thinking animatronic teddy bear (simply Named Teddy) is the film’s saving grace more than once. Why? Because it is a character that could have easily been played for cutesy laughs and smaltzy interaction, but instead is played as the brain of the film. He is cute, for Christs’ sake it’s a teddy bear, but he never over does it in a film where everything else does.
There is a lot of controversy surrounding how Kubrick would have never allowed the film to become the three hanky weepfest that it is. I believe that to be true. His last film was one were audiences flocked to see Nichole Kidman and Tom Cruise buck naked and were disappointed when they were faced with an obtuse movie that dealt with real issues, emotions and the extreme complexity within. I’m sure he would have treated the material with the same depth he showed in all his work.
Unfortunately Spielberg is not capable of that kind of depth. Even his best films are simply entertainment pictures (DUEL, JAWS, RAIDERS) that exist to entertain and little else. That is fine, people need entertainment. But when faced with material that demands more the answer is not to rework it to a breaking point so audiences can feel all choked up. It’s a problem Spielberg faces every time he tries to do something serious. Even a film as important as SHINDLER’S LIST is hurt (though not destroyed) by his overbearing need to manipulate the audience into tears and reactions. For God’s sake we are watching a film about the Holocaust, we do not need any manipulation to feel something! We don’t need the little kid we don’t know running from the Nazi’s and hiding in shit, we don’t need the light shinning down from God on Shindler as he gives a speech that explains every point you were supposed to have gotten out of the film.
I suppose my biggest complaint with A.I and Spielberg’s work is that he treats the audience like they are feeble minded by watering down actual ideas in his work and overstating the elements that he really wants you to feel. Let me feel something on my own, don’t force my attention into it. His work is the epitome of the Hollywood ideal that Audiences are stupid and have to have everything spelled out for them. Its insulting.
I also have a beef with his use of Kids in his films. Most of the time they are there simply as a focal point for the young audience. I understand that and it is fine. My problem is that he uses kids whenever he feels the need to twist an emotion out of an audience. E.T. is the worst for this as the kids are chased, threatened, abused etc. all to get the audience to cry along with the movie. E.T. himself could be seen as a big kid that Spielberg ultimately KILLS to elicit a reaction, but then back peddles and for no reason at all, brings back to life for the triumphant resurrection! I would hate to see what Spielberg would do to the Christ story!
But back to the kid thing. In abusing the kids for the audiences pleasure (and kids are very often abused in his pictures, both JURASSIC PARK flicks, E.T, HOOK and now A.I.) Spielberg shows a very sadistic instinct. Its almost as if he is inviting you the audience to enjoy the degradation of the children (in fact in JURASSIC PARK the scenes in which the little boys are threatened or hurt it is the good guys doing it and usually ends with an audience laugh). In A.I. this is taken to ridiculous extremes since the kid can’t die. There is even a scene where the kid confronts another robot made to look like him (why would the company looking to market robot children make all of them look exactly the same. Wouldn’t that make keeping track of them really more difficult that it would be worth) and he literally rips off his face and knocks off his head! But it gets worse! I find the way he handles the sexuality of children to be very creepy as well. Especially the scene in A.I where all the kids gather around Robokid and touch him repeatedly. Yes within the context of the story it makes sense, but did it have to happen by the pool so all the little boys are almost naked. Did it have to be shot and blocked so it feels like a rape scene? Did the big bully kid need to look in Haley’s shorts to see if he had a dick? Did Spielberg really need to abuse all those half naked native kids in INDIANNA JONES AND THE TEMPLE OF DOOM?Was the scene where all the kids gather around and paint Robin Williams body really need to be there in HOOK? These are just questions to ponder the true meanings of.
If you catch A.I. in a theater make sure it is a matinee or second run and you probably will not hate it. But if you are like me and have a real problem being manipulated instead of honestly engaged by a film then stay away at all costs! I think I should go read some Phillip K. Dick now to cleanse my palette. (AC)
And here is a clip of Haley Joel Osmet's finest work outside of The Sixth Sense...
