There's so much I like about Guillermo del Toro, his aesthetic, his use of practical effects (when he can), his continual casting of Ron Perlman, yet I don't really love his films. Pan's Labyrinth was awesome, but I don't care much for superhero movies. Hellboy I and II and Blade II are fine for what they are, but I can't view them as anything more than good. Even though I'm not a huge fan of his work, I'm excited that he gets to work because he creates some pretty amazing worlds.
Aside from The Devil's Backbone, Cronos may be de Toro's most restrained movie, which makes sense as it's his first feature. It's about an antiques dealer who finds a mechanism in one of his pieces and, upon activating it, is revitalized. Oh, it also gives him a powerful urge to drink blood. Meanwhile, a rich dying man has been looking for this item for years because he believes it will give him eternal life and keeps sending Ron Perlman to collect it from the antiques dealer. It's a variation on vampire lore which means I've front-loaded October with alternative takes on vampires, thus far.
Del Toro's got a great eye for set design and staging. The warehouse home of the sick man, de la Guardia (Claudio Brook), is sterile and eerie with tiny statues wrapped in plastic hanging from the ceiling and a museum of body parts removed from his person. On the other hand, the antiques dealer, Jesus Gris (Frederico Luppi), eventually moves to a shack on the roof of his house and the setting there is almost magical with shafts of light beaming down through holes in the ceiling. This instinct for creating memorable locations and sets is part of what makes del Toro's films so enthralling to look at.
These old men fighting over the mysterious mechanism each have a protector of sorts. De la Guardia has his nephew, Angel (Perlman) who goes out into the world and does the dirty business and Jesus has his innocent granddaughter who has a mysterious understand of the dangers her grandfather is getting into and a high tolerance for the insanely creepy. There's a lot of importance in character names: Angel de la Guardia means "guardian angel" and Jesus Gris means "gray Jesus." I really want to attach significance to the granddaughter's name, Aurora and I don't think it's a struggle. The rooftop shack fills with shafts of light from the sky and she is seen wearing a red and green jacket later in the film both of which make reference to aurora borealis. She is literally the light in the sky in Cronos.
It was very strange when I realized that Jesus was going to be the main character. I'm not used to movies that feature older people as the protagonists, let alone horror movies. It makes the events of the film that much more believable. Instead of some young person who just wants to live forever, it's a man approaching his last days. He has a happy life and is the guardian of his young grandchild. It's not much of a leap to see why he'd want to prolong his life. The same is true for the dying antagonist. It's a smart decision in a smart movie.
Cronos shot up to probably my second favorite del Toro movie with ease (behind Pan's Labyinth). I'd been contemplating buying the Criterion Blu Ray any time there is a 50% off sale, but balked. I made a huge mistake.
Stray observations I couldn't work in above
-- Ron Perlman likes to hitch himself to talented foreign filmmakers early. He's in this and Jean-Pierre Jeunet's The City of Lost Children. Both del Toro and Jeunet have worked with him multiple times.
-- The backwards funeral suit Jesus wears throughout the end of the film is a welcome bit of humor during some dark scenes. For some reason, it reminded me of the walking headless corpse in Re-Animator.
-- The funeral director and his view of himself as an artist struck me as an homage to Dead and Buried. I think this supports that theory:
And now... a rant.
I watched Cronos on Netflix Instead View right after watching a hitch-free episode of Twin Peaks on the same. However, whereas Twin Peaks was smooth as sil, Cronos had a consistently jerky image. Not enough to really hurt the viewing experience, but enough to be noticeable and annoying. Meanwhile, the sound was perfect. This leads me to believe that there is something wrong with the file Netflix uploaded to their servers (or however they get stuff on Instant View).
It's not enough that Netflix only has a small portion of their movies on Instant View. Or that movies are routinely being picked up and dropped from the roster. Or that some of the foreign movies are only available in dubbed format. But we also have to deal with glitchy Instant View titles? How can a company justify jacking up their prices or splitting streaming and DVD-by-mail when there are still so many issues with one of the options? Unless Netflix can offer nearly flawless playback and give the customer (nearly) everything they want from streaming (more selection, the option for subtitles both to avoid dubbing and for the hearing impaired, quality image, etc), they should never have even thought about charging people for Instant View.
Wednesday, October 5, 2011
Tuesday, October 4, 2011
So Many Hours of Baseball... in Chart Form!
The above image is taken from Flip Flop Flyball and is a chart of how many hours of baseball each team played during the 2011 regular season. If you haven't been to the web site before and you love baseball and/or infographs, you need to check it out. The creator of this material is a British man named Craig Robinson who came to the game late and is a Yankees fan, because why not? Aside from loving the fact that a person from a largely baseball-less culture could fall so strongly for a foreign game, I love Robinson's approach to the game. He has a wholly unique perspective and sees the games in ways I'd never dreamed.
This post isn't really about pimping for a person I've never met. Robinson created the above graph (for a bigger version, click here because I haven't linked to his page enough) and it got me thinking. Unsurprisingly, the Red Sox and Yankees are at the top of the list with most hours played (a bright note knowing that we played more hours than anyone since the season ended prematurely... at least we got to watch more baseball during the season! Yeah, that's not working for me, either). They play a particular brand of baseball in which taking pitches is de rigueur and the offense scores a lot of runs. Any fan of these teams can tell you that when they face off against each other, you can expect a four to five hour game.
But what I find particularly interesting about this chart is that there seems to be no correlation between record and game length. The best team in the American League (by record), the Yankees, rates at second most in hours played yet the best team in the National League (as well as overall), the Phillies, are fourth from the least number of hours played. The rest of the playoff teams fall randomly between.
There's no real logic to any of it. Bad teams might play shorter games because they can't score runs. Then again, maybe they play longer games because they can't make outs. And the reverse holds true. It would be interesting to see if the bad teams with good pitching and bad offenses play shorter games than bad teams with decent offenses and poor pitching. I'd also be interested to see a companion graph that charts how many pitches each team threw throughout the year and how many their opponents through against them to see if there's a correlation. Hmm... maybe I am starting to think a little outside the box.
Robinson also made an informative and amusing chart for the eight teams in the playoffs (now seven... sorry Rays...) for Grantland.
Giant Animal Division: Lake Placid
I'm mad at all of you. Why didn't anyone tell me how awesome Lake Placid is?
OK, so I'm slightly culpable. I love giant animal movies including those that get heavy rotation on the Syfy channel. Even when they're terrible, at least there's going to be some carnage or ridiculousness. But Lake Placid isn't terrible. It's awesome and suspenseful and funny as hell. Absurdly, it has a Metacritic rating of 33. I don't know what people were expecting from a film about a GIANT CROCODILE IN MAINE.
I blame the pedigree of writer David E. Kelley. I'm sure critics were expecting some political commentary or insights into the human psyche or something (I'm actually not sure what they should expect as I've never watched any of his shows). And no, the movie doesn't have much to say about anything, but that doesn't mean it's any less of a movie. The dialogue is amazing, the attacks generated some highly amused audible responses from me (love the bear), and the plotting is a lot more sensical than most horror movies. I particularly enjoy Brendan Gleeson's reactions to everyone's sarcastic remarks to him. Actually, I enjoy everything revolving around Gleeson (even though his accent waivers constantly and I think the line "[his] origins [are] a mystery" is a reference to this fact) which includes his interactions with Oliver Platt.
Bridget Fonda accomplishes a remarkable feat in Lake Placid. She takes a role that in most hand would be shrill and obnoxious but makes it work. She's generally amusing and plays the extremes of the role very well. The biggest problem is that the romance between her and Bill Pullman is wholly unnecessary and poorly developed, especially since she recently was in hysterics about her lover/boss entering a relationship with her friend. The love angle is half-baked and drags the movie down every time it's brought to the forefront.
Steve Miner directs and his instincts are more suited to this material than the supernatural House (though I still love House). Also, he's had fifteen or so years work on his directorial approach. It's disappointing that he left the horror-comedy subgenre (or even just horror). His work outside of it nearly isn't as accomplished and he clearly has a knack.
Lake Placid is tons of fun and I believe signifies the start of Betty White's career into foul-mouthed old woman. I'll leave you with my favorite line and the one that stuck with me (I'd seen the ending of Lake Placid once a long time ago): "You can't take a cow by eminent domain!"
OK, so I'm slightly culpable. I love giant animal movies including those that get heavy rotation on the Syfy channel. Even when they're terrible, at least there's going to be some carnage or ridiculousness. But Lake Placid isn't terrible. It's awesome and suspenseful and funny as hell. Absurdly, it has a Metacritic rating of 33. I don't know what people were expecting from a film about a GIANT CROCODILE IN MAINE.
I blame the pedigree of writer David E. Kelley. I'm sure critics were expecting some political commentary or insights into the human psyche or something (I'm actually not sure what they should expect as I've never watched any of his shows). And no, the movie doesn't have much to say about anything, but that doesn't mean it's any less of a movie. The dialogue is amazing, the attacks generated some highly amused audible responses from me (love the bear), and the plotting is a lot more sensical than most horror movies. I particularly enjoy Brendan Gleeson's reactions to everyone's sarcastic remarks to him. Actually, I enjoy everything revolving around Gleeson (even though his accent waivers constantly and I think the line "[his] origins [are] a mystery" is a reference to this fact) which includes his interactions with Oliver Platt.
Bridget Fonda accomplishes a remarkable feat in Lake Placid. She takes a role that in most hand would be shrill and obnoxious but makes it work. She's generally amusing and plays the extremes of the role very well. The biggest problem is that the romance between her and Bill Pullman is wholly unnecessary and poorly developed, especially since she recently was in hysterics about her lover/boss entering a relationship with her friend. The love angle is half-baked and drags the movie down every time it's brought to the forefront.
Steve Miner directs and his instincts are more suited to this material than the supernatural House (though I still love House). Also, he's had fifteen or so years work on his directorial approach. It's disappointing that he left the horror-comedy subgenre (or even just horror). His work outside of it nearly isn't as accomplished and he clearly has a knack.
Lake Placid is tons of fun and I believe signifies the start of Betty White's career into foul-mouthed old woman. I'll leave you with my favorite line and the one that stuck with me (I'd seen the ending of Lake Placid once a long time ago): "You can't take a cow by eminent domain!"
Monday, October 3, 2011
For When You Just Want to Summon a Succubus: Dreamaniac
I had planned on watching Special Effects, but upon seeing Dreamaniac on my Instant View queue, I just couldn't pass up the opportunity for an obscure Natalie Portmanteau: Deathdreamaniac (apologies to those unfamiliar with Shanrock Trivia terminology). Here is the Netflix synopsis of Deathdream:
Heavy metal songwriter Adam (Thomas Bern) ignores his devoted girlfriend, Pat (Ashlyn Gere), because he's obsessed with Lily (Sylvia Summers), a seductive woman haunting his dreams. When he uses black magic to bring Lily to life, he discovers too late that she is a murderous succubus. Although Adam is held spellbound by Lily, Pat fights back against the creature when she begins slaughtering the drunken college students partying at their home.There were no illusions that this was going to be a good movie, but I was hoping that the heavy metal aspect was going to have a little more influence than it does. I think Dreamaniac uses the fact that he writes heavy metal lyrics as an excuse to make him into black magic in order to summon the succubus. And you know Adam's way into heavy metal because he wears a Def Leppard t-shirt throughout the first act of the film.
The film opens with an epic synth score that gets pretty close to the best work that Goblin did for Dario Argento's films. Clearly, the filmmakers new it was awesome because they put it over credits on a black background without a pre-credit scare. Unfortunately, the music throughout the rest of the films sucks and is one of the many aspects that sucks all life out of the movie (well, the life that the succubus hasn't taken, at least).
I was mildly surprised at how well the dialogue was written even though none of the actors are really good enough to deliver it. There were some legitimately funny lines that got lost in the mouths of the actors as well as some funny set-ups that were screwed up by a complete lack of comic timing. The writer, Helen Robinson, did all right for herself even though she blatantly stole the cocaine sneeze from Annie Hall (what else did you steal, Helen?). But don't get me wrong. There are some pretty idiotic script elements. If the succubus was trying to tear Andy apart in his dreams, what does he think is going to happen when he summons her? And why did one of the murder victims come back as a zombie but not the others? And what's up with the (spoiler alert for a shitty movie) fake ending where Andy was actually writing a pulp novel of what we've just seen and the tag at the end of it? It makes no sense.
The biggest issue with Dreamaniac (aside from everything else) is that it doesn't go far enough. Everybody is hooking up with everyone else, yet the movie isn't remotely sexy or titillating. There's plenty of murder and mayhem, but until the end, very little blood spilled and much of it is cut away from (seriously, we don't get to see either of the times the succubus bites a penis off?). I think someone could make a very fun a vicious low-budget remake of this. It's really not far off from being a great party movie (though it's not very close, either). Some decent actors and death set-pieces are all you need.
Writing this piece made me fascinated with the director, David DeCoteau (if that's his real name). I parenthetical because the dude has at least nine aliases on his IMDB page. It looks like he uses some to traffic in the soft and hard core porn world. I'm also jealous of anyone who was brought in under Roger Corman's wing.
Finally, at first I thought Clint Howard was going to be in Dreamaniac based on Netflix' picture with the film (which is quite small):
It's only when I looked at a bigger image that I realized it's not him, which was a disappointment, but also very confusing since no one in the films looks anything like that bald killer:
Rick Perry's Political Aesthetic
Let's try to keep politics out of this. Let's forget that there's no context for anything presented. Let's ignore the jingoism. Don't notice the fact that Rick Perry is speaking in empty words. Certainly, set aside the notion that one man cannot be held responsible for the current political state and the fact that partisan politics have seemingly never been stronger.
I want to focus on the big question here: did Rick Perry hire Zack Snyder to make is political ad?
I want to focus on the big question here: did Rick Perry hire Zack Snyder to make is political ad?
The Undead Are Packing Needles: Deathdream (aka Dead of Night)
Bob Clark had a strange career. He's got three legitimate classics that show a mastery of different styles and tones : Black Christmas, A Christmas Story, and Porky's. Yet he ended his career on the likes of Baby Geniuses 1 and 2 and Karate Dog (sadly, he was killed along with his son by a drunk driver in 2007). Some would even throw 1990's Loose Cannons into that pile of stinkers, but I have a soft spot for that film.
Clark is known primarily for comedies (as much as I want to believe otherwise, Black Christmas still falls well below the cult/mainstream divide, especially after the flashy big-budget remake). I'm not sure why he transitioned away from horror after his Sherlock Holmes/Jack the Ripper mystery Murder by Decree, but it's a little disappointing as not only did he have a knack for the genre, he helped to create the slasher sub-genre with Black Christmas.
Deathdream was released mere months before Black Christmas and one can really see the influence of his experience making the former on the latter. There's heavy use of POV camerawork early in Deathdream which Black Christmas would use to great effect and many sound and music cues are nearly identical in the films. Both films also continue action over the end credits. Deathdream isn't as good as Black Christmas, but there's definitely a direct line between the two.
The basic plot entails a son, Andy, returning home from Vietnam after his parents receive notice that he has been killed in action (the film implies that he returns as result of a sort of prayer and follows the "be careful what you wish for" model). He's nothing like he was before the war which his mother attributes to needing time to settle in and recover but his dad isn't so sure, claiming he never acted like that when he got back from Korea (or maybe WWII, I forget which). There's a daughter/sister who is generally treated like shit even though they keep her in the dark about everything yet she still retains a mostly positive attitude. Coinciding with his return, a truck driver who gave Andy a ride into town has been found dead. Suspicions rise. A family falls apart.
Deathdream is unlike most horror movies I've seen. It's deliberate and focused more on the dissolution of the family than on shock, scares, and gore. It's suspenseful, but it's not the stuff of nightmares (though my fiance jumped several times and seemed legitimately creeped out the whole time). The film seems more concerned with making a comment on what the Vietnam War is doing to families and the soldiers fighting. Andy comes home and simply sits around, rocking ceaselessly in his creaky rocking chair staring into space. Clearly, his zombie-like state is representative of PTSD. In order to remain youthful and not start decaying, Andy takes blood from others and injects it into himself, much like many Vietnam vets turned to drugs upon their return home. Amidst all of this, his mother is unwilling to seek outside help and his dad gets drunk. Deathdream works very well on this allegorical level and doesn't feel too heavy-handed in its approach.
But Deathdream isn't just about Vietnam. It's about an undead soldier! And truth-be-told, once it turned out that Andy didn't look like a zombie, I had no idea where the movie was going. The action moves very slowly. To the point where I questioned if there would even be a market for a movie like this today (I'm not even sure there was in 1974). However, the pace does a great job of building tension and allows all of the characters time to draw their own conclusions about Andy. The closest comparison to Deathdream I though about is George Romero's Martin (1977). Both are sort of unconventional vampire stories in a way that take their time to tell the story. Also, both feature early work from Tom Savini (Deathdream was his first job).
Deathdream slow-burns to a pretty exciting climax where Savini gets to show off that he was always pretty good with make-up effects. The payoff isn't unexpected, but it's appropriate. It's not the greatest horror movie I've ever seen, but it attempts a lot more than most. I highly recommend it if you're looking for something other than disposable thrills.
Clark is known primarily for comedies (as much as I want to believe otherwise, Black Christmas still falls well below the cult/mainstream divide, especially after the flashy big-budget remake). I'm not sure why he transitioned away from horror after his Sherlock Holmes/Jack the Ripper mystery Murder by Decree, but it's a little disappointing as not only did he have a knack for the genre, he helped to create the slasher sub-genre with Black Christmas.
Deathdream was released mere months before Black Christmas and one can really see the influence of his experience making the former on the latter. There's heavy use of POV camerawork early in Deathdream which Black Christmas would use to great effect and many sound and music cues are nearly identical in the films. Both films also continue action over the end credits. Deathdream isn't as good as Black Christmas, but there's definitely a direct line between the two.
The basic plot entails a son, Andy, returning home from Vietnam after his parents receive notice that he has been killed in action (the film implies that he returns as result of a sort of prayer and follows the "be careful what you wish for" model). He's nothing like he was before the war which his mother attributes to needing time to settle in and recover but his dad isn't so sure, claiming he never acted like that when he got back from Korea (or maybe WWII, I forget which). There's a daughter/sister who is generally treated like shit even though they keep her in the dark about everything yet she still retains a mostly positive attitude. Coinciding with his return, a truck driver who gave Andy a ride into town has been found dead. Suspicions rise. A family falls apart.
Deathdream is unlike most horror movies I've seen. It's deliberate and focused more on the dissolution of the family than on shock, scares, and gore. It's suspenseful, but it's not the stuff of nightmares (though my fiance jumped several times and seemed legitimately creeped out the whole time). The film seems more concerned with making a comment on what the Vietnam War is doing to families and the soldiers fighting. Andy comes home and simply sits around, rocking ceaselessly in his creaky rocking chair staring into space. Clearly, his zombie-like state is representative of PTSD. In order to remain youthful and not start decaying, Andy takes blood from others and injects it into himself, much like many Vietnam vets turned to drugs upon their return home. Amidst all of this, his mother is unwilling to seek outside help and his dad gets drunk. Deathdream works very well on this allegorical level and doesn't feel too heavy-handed in its approach.
But Deathdream isn't just about Vietnam. It's about an undead soldier! And truth-be-told, once it turned out that Andy didn't look like a zombie, I had no idea where the movie was going. The action moves very slowly. To the point where I questioned if there would even be a market for a movie like this today (I'm not even sure there was in 1974). However, the pace does a great job of building tension and allows all of the characters time to draw their own conclusions about Andy. The closest comparison to Deathdream I though about is George Romero's Martin (1977). Both are sort of unconventional vampire stories in a way that take their time to tell the story. Also, both feature early work from Tom Savini (Deathdream was his first job).
Deathdream slow-burns to a pretty exciting climax where Savini gets to show off that he was always pretty good with make-up effects. The payoff isn't unexpected, but it's appropriate. It's not the greatest horror movie I've ever seen, but it attempts a lot more than most. I highly recommend it if you're looking for something other than disposable thrills.
Sunday, October 2, 2011
Short and Sweet
Gotta put out my Netflix Roundup before I go on my horror binge and write about those all month long. It's going to be a fun month.
The X-Files: I Want to Believe -- Chris Carter
After spending much of the past year watching ever episode of The X-Files, as well as the movie and The Simpsons crossover, and toiling through season nine (Agent Reyes is a bore), I was excited to get to the final movie. All I knew about the movie was the subtitle "I Want to Believe" and that there's lots of snow. Well, "I Want to Believe" is featured prominently on a poster featuring a UFO throughout the series and there was lots of snow in the first movie, so I was fully expecting alien mythology. Instead, I got a shitty police procedural about a priest who may or may not have psychic powers but definitely diddled little boys. I'm a big fan of Billy Connolly and he did well with the role, but dear lord couldn't Carter and co-writer Frank Spotnitz come up with something better? It feels like they had this script lying around and decided that, with a few minor tweaks, it could be an X-File! And all the bullshit about Scully and the boy who needs brain surgery is just a drag. We don't watch The X-Files for melodrama. We watch if for awesome, which there is very little of here. It they had to go the monster-of-the-week rout, why not do it like one of the oddball, genre-defying efforts from seasons 4-6? They needed Vince Gilligan on this one. It's also a little odd ignoring everything from season 9 and even calling it The X-Files when neither Scully or Mulder are agents anymore (and I'm not a fan of them being lovers... it's weird). And Scully is ridiculously written. She begs Mulder to help the FBI yet almost immediately demands that he stop. It's obvious from the moment they meet in the first episode that he's obsessive. Why is she surprised when he won't give up? Scully's much smarter than she's made out to be in this film. Finally, why are Amanda Peet and Xzibit there? Wouldn't it make more sense to have Skinner draw them back into a case? This movie blows.
Ghosts of Mars -- John Carpenter
Speaking of blows... what happened to John Carpenter? I have yet to see The Ward, but haven't heard good things. His episode of Masters of Horror, "Cigarette Burns," was pretty middling (I haven't seen "Pro-Life yet"). He's made some of the greatest horror movies ever, yet hasn't really done anything worthwhile since 1994 (In the Mouth of Madness... though 1998's Vampires is kind of fun if only for James Woods). You hear about director's losing their touch as they get older, but Carpenter underwent a drastic quality slide. The fact that he took a nine year break from making movies explains a lot about his mindset (along with him actually explaining a lot about his mindset). It's possible he could have gotten a good movie out of Ghosts of Mars. The idea of demonic spirits possessing a person and turning them into blood-thirsty demons always fun. Add to that that when the possessed body is killed, the spirits can simply move on to another body. It's an unstoppable force. But having Ice Cube and Natasha Henstridge as your insanely uncharismatic leads is brutal. They are supposed to have lots of playful banter but it simply dies in their mouths (sadly, I can't find any clips of this online). Jason Statham is the only one who really comes out of this film looking good. At least I'll always have The Thing...
The Front Page -- Lewis Milestone
His Girl Friday -- Howard Hawkes
The Front Page -- Billy Wilder
Maybe Carpenter was looking to replicate some of the insanely witty dialogue from one of his cinematic hero's films. Sadly, he didn't have Rosalind Russell or Cary Grant in his cast (now that's a version of Ghosts of Mars I want to see).
Modesty Blaise -- Joseph Losey
This films is poorly conceived at nearly every level. When one thinks of super-spies and parodies, Joseph Losey doesn't immediately pop into mind. His sensibilities couldn't be more inappropriate for the material. The man lacks the sort of broad, comic timing to pull off any of the gags in this film. Add onto that Monica Vitti whose dull, disinterested, vacant stare was perfect for the slow and deliberate shooting style of Antonioni (whose films I don't much care for) is totally out of place as an ass-kicking super-spy. She literally has zero personality. Sure, she's attractive in a bland sort of way in that the longer you look at her, the sleepier you get, but she's certainly no hero (or anti-hero, as the case may be). Modesty Blaise the film, as opposed to the character, is sprawling and confusing with bizarre voiceover that seems to be coming from people spying on characters but in reality seems impossible. Maybe I'm missing the joke, but this film falls into that pile of movies that people can only enjoy for camp, except that at two hours, it's too long even for that.
Thank god I'm spending a month with horror movies. Even if they're bad, someone's going to get killed or get naked (or both!).
The X-Files: I Want to Believe -- Chris Carter
After spending much of the past year watching ever episode of The X-Files, as well as the movie and The Simpsons crossover, and toiling through season nine (Agent Reyes is a bore), I was excited to get to the final movie. All I knew about the movie was the subtitle "I Want to Believe" and that there's lots of snow. Well, "I Want to Believe" is featured prominently on a poster featuring a UFO throughout the series and there was lots of snow in the first movie, so I was fully expecting alien mythology. Instead, I got a shitty police procedural about a priest who may or may not have psychic powers but definitely diddled little boys. I'm a big fan of Billy Connolly and he did well with the role, but dear lord couldn't Carter and co-writer Frank Spotnitz come up with something better? It feels like they had this script lying around and decided that, with a few minor tweaks, it could be an X-File! And all the bullshit about Scully and the boy who needs brain surgery is just a drag. We don't watch The X-Files for melodrama. We watch if for awesome, which there is very little of here. It they had to go the monster-of-the-week rout, why not do it like one of the oddball, genre-defying efforts from seasons 4-6? They needed Vince Gilligan on this one. It's also a little odd ignoring everything from season 9 and even calling it The X-Files when neither Scully or Mulder are agents anymore (and I'm not a fan of them being lovers... it's weird). And Scully is ridiculously written. She begs Mulder to help the FBI yet almost immediately demands that he stop. It's obvious from the moment they meet in the first episode that he's obsessive. Why is she surprised when he won't give up? Scully's much smarter than she's made out to be in this film. Finally, why are Amanda Peet and Xzibit there? Wouldn't it make more sense to have Skinner draw them back into a case? This movie blows.
Ghosts of Mars -- John Carpenter
Speaking of blows... what happened to John Carpenter? I have yet to see The Ward, but haven't heard good things. His episode of Masters of Horror, "Cigarette Burns," was pretty middling (I haven't seen "Pro-Life yet"). He's made some of the greatest horror movies ever, yet hasn't really done anything worthwhile since 1994 (In the Mouth of Madness... though 1998's Vampires is kind of fun if only for James Woods). You hear about director's losing their touch as they get older, but Carpenter underwent a drastic quality slide. The fact that he took a nine year break from making movies explains a lot about his mindset (along with him actually explaining a lot about his mindset). It's possible he could have gotten a good movie out of Ghosts of Mars. The idea of demonic spirits possessing a person and turning them into blood-thirsty demons always fun. Add to that that when the possessed body is killed, the spirits can simply move on to another body. It's an unstoppable force. But having Ice Cube and Natasha Henstridge as your insanely uncharismatic leads is brutal. They are supposed to have lots of playful banter but it simply dies in their mouths (sadly, I can't find any clips of this online). Jason Statham is the only one who really comes out of this film looking good. At least I'll always have The Thing...
The Front Page -- Lewis Milestone
His Girl Friday -- Howard Hawkes
The Front Page -- Billy Wilder
Maybe Carpenter was looking to replicate some of the insanely witty dialogue from one of his cinematic hero's films. Sadly, he didn't have Rosalind Russell or Cary Grant in his cast (now that's a version of Ghosts of Mars I want to see).
Modesty Blaise -- Joseph Losey
This films is poorly conceived at nearly every level. When one thinks of super-spies and parodies, Joseph Losey doesn't immediately pop into mind. His sensibilities couldn't be more inappropriate for the material. The man lacks the sort of broad, comic timing to pull off any of the gags in this film. Add onto that Monica Vitti whose dull, disinterested, vacant stare was perfect for the slow and deliberate shooting style of Antonioni (whose films I don't much care for) is totally out of place as an ass-kicking super-spy. She literally has zero personality. Sure, she's attractive in a bland sort of way in that the longer you look at her, the sleepier you get, but she's certainly no hero (or anti-hero, as the case may be). Modesty Blaise the film, as opposed to the character, is sprawling and confusing with bizarre voiceover that seems to be coming from people spying on characters but in reality seems impossible. Maybe I'm missing the joke, but this film falls into that pile of movies that people can only enjoy for camp, except that at two hours, it's too long even for that.
Thank god I'm spending a month with horror movies. Even if they're bad, someone's going to get killed or get naked (or both!).
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