Special From the Vaults: To the Wayback Machine

Okay, wayback might be pushing a little bit, but this is (arguably) the oldest piece I could find that the Cap'n wrote about film. There may be some high school related ephemera, but as I've lost all of the "year end recaps" prior to 2003 to the vast wasteland of outdated email accounts, what I have left is a recap from nearly eight years ago.

To set things up: as it states in the first sentence, the Cap'n emailed my end of year roundups to friends, family, et al. For years, I didn't do much blogging, and what I did was limited to silly things like livejournal that are almost entirely gibberish*, so this is about as "readable" as they come.

That said, punctuation is still a mess, sentence fragments abound, and I had a very hard time capitalizing letters for some reason, often arbitrarily. I opted not to change anything, so what's below can be embarrassing, at least to me. Still, it's a valuable learning tool, or if nothing else an example of how far I have (or haven't) come. Enjoy.

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I send this out every year as an email, but there's no reason you shouldn't see it too, so here you go. comment freely.


i'd be remiss not to note that this year is by and large the YEAR OF SEQUELS. it was a good year for franchises (or a bad one, depending on your opinion) but at any rate we saw a lot of remakes, second and third chapters, and reruns of movies we thought had already come and gone.
as oscar season begins the grand ascension to top of all things media, i'll go out on a limb and offer what i think will end up doing the golden globe/oscar strut. Let's see... The Last Samurai, Mystic River, 21 Grams, Big Fish, Cold Mountain, The House of Sand and Fog, Mona Lisa Smile, and Return of the King. How many of these did i see? just one. (i don't anticipate seeing any of the other ones, except Big Fish. i am as curious as anyone else.)

now that we have oscar hogs out of the way ( i can not and will not vouch for the quality of any one i haven't seen, but expect to see some variation on them this spring, depending on advertising dollars) i'll quickly dispense of other movies i wanted to see but didn't get to: Lost in Translation, Max, Intolerable Cruelty, Dirty Pretty Things, Matchstick Men, and ... well, i'm sure there are more. it's always difficult to remember when you're in the midst of a list.

there are, of course, the movies i didn't want to see, but any raves/pans/etc would be appreciated: Underworld, Gothika, Charlie's Angels Full Throttle, Freaky Friday, 2 Fast 3 Furious, ahahaha yeah you got me, i don't really care if these movies were 5 Star brilliant! i don't plan on seeing them. ever. (try me, davis. try me)

normally i rank these fuckers, but to be honest, i just don't know how to put these above/below each other this year. i enjoyed/hated all of the following for various reasons, so i'm just going to list them and tell you what i thought. (to hell with organization!)

in no particular order:


The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King - with a few minor quibbles, i thought it was great. i anticipate the extended version will fix all of the little quirks i had, but nevertheless you have to hand it to Peter Jackson for setting out to make this epic and succeeding in a way George Lucas and The Wachowski Brothers could only dream of. Gollum/Smeagol looked even better this time around, and the arc of the movie kept my eyes on screen the whole time (this is rare) i can dig it. as an entire series, i expect the lord of the rings will be remembered down the line with all other "classics" and for that, hurrah. the cast was uniformly strong, but special kudos to Miranda Otto, Sean Astin, Andy Serkis, Ian McKellan, and Elijah Wood. and Shelob looked better than i thought she would.

Spider - This is the type of movie Cronenberg hasn't tried since Dead Ringers or The Dead Zone; a character study without the obvious horror manifesting. the slow unraveling of Spider Clegg's mind, the use of images and colour, editing choices designed to disorientate... Spider demands to be viewed repeatedly, there are no other options. Ralph Fiennes gets away from dreck like Maid To Order 2: JLo, and makes this fragile, twisted wreck of a man someone we want unravel the mess inside of his brain. kudos to Miranda Richardson for taking a triple role and not letting anything slide into parody. i don't want to spoil Spider for anyone, so go rent it.

The Rundown - Yes, THAT the Rundown. The one with the Rock. And Stiffler. And Christopher Walken (and Spud from Trainspotting, Ewan Bremmer) It sets itself up early to let the audience know this is nothing beyond a popcorn film, and by that criteria it succeeds admirably. Basically, it's just Midnight Run in the jungle, so if you liked Midnight Run, you'll love it. Dwayne Johnson has a steady career ahead of himself if he chooses the action-comedy genre. (he has an amiable, goofy charm, and a physique that lend him well. oh, and a passing of the torch from arnold. watch the beginning carefully) Stiffler is, well, Stiffler. If you like Seann William Scott in general, you'll have no complaints. Christopher Walken is just CHEWING scenery here, and it's worth watching just to see him imitate the "christopher walken" parody (and during a tooth fairy metaphor, no less) dumb fun.

The Texas Chainsaw Massacre - would be less polarizing if it had ANY other name. for one thing, it's just not fair to compare it to the original, because OF COURSE it doesn't stand up. as a gritty, high level hollywood thriller, it works pretty well. the camp value of the sequels is nowhere to be found, and leatherface is scary again, not just some guy in a dress. there's an attempt to tie this in to Ed Gein a little more, and to provide a back story to Leatherface, but honestly, who came to see that? TCM is a decent horror movie, and it will only disappoint those expecting the original or better. speaking of the original...

House of 1,000 Corpses - tries too hard to attain the same "shock value" of 70's horror movies (last house on the left, friday the 13th, tcm, etc) but somewhere along the line Rob Zombie forgot that a horror movie needs a story or at the very least someone you care about. House of 1,000 has neither (nor does it have the 1,000 corpses boasted). Instead, we have some hokum about "Dr. Satan", a family that, aside from being crazy, has nothing to do with him, and a gas station/museum/carnival ride owner who curses with intermittent dialogue. this movie is rife with bad choices, and i can't honestly believe that it has a cult audience. i could go on and on about the amateur acting, the miserable "plot twists", or the longest pull back for a death scene ever, but instead i'll just chuckle thinking about Agatha Crispies cereal.

Kill Bill Volume One - Quentin Tarantino's ode to grindhouse flicks of the seventies is a labour of love, and it shows. From his choices in casting to the music or costumes and editing, Quentin lays his inner film geek on the line here. Uma Thurman is a sight to behold in this movie. Cheers to her for coming back strong and shaking off Mia Wallace once and for all. If you haven't seen Kill Bill, know this: This is a VIOLENT movie. I won't say film. This isn't art, this is a loving tribute to a genre with a built in audience, and Tarantino knew it. He doesn't disappoint, and i expect Volume Two to be even better. As a film maker, he's stepping up his game, and Kill Bill is technically superior without being too gimmicky.

Cabin Fever - Eli Roth learned a thing or two from Evil Dead. That's crucial to understanding the marketing behind this low budget gem. Cabin Fever is atypical of horror movies, and that bugs a lot of horror fans, but this isn't quite a scare fest. It's a genre bender, pitting the cast of a Teen Sex Comedy in a Cabin in the Woods Horror Movie. While it has problems (the movie doesn't know where to end and stumbles a bit in the final act), it's nevertheless a nice first film to build a career of off, and they marketed the shit out of this movie (when i went to see it, great steps were made to replicate set pieces, "authentic" paraphenilia, etc.) plus it doesn't look as cheap as it was to make, and there are some wonderful nods to past cheapie thrillers.

The Animatrix, Matrix Reloaded, and Revolutions - First, let it be known i am NOT a matrix fan. when i saw the first movie, i hated it. It felt like someone had taken Dark City and put kung fu in place of acting chops. That being said, the Animatrix was a nice step towards not hating Reloaded as much. Providing some interesting context to the more interesting aspects of this series makes it head and shoulders better than the movies. Now, onto Reloaded. I was shocked how bad this movie was. The actors were half assing it (even Laurence Fishburne looked like he forgot how to emote), the dialogue was stilted and unecessarily complicated (i'm sorry, you can't try to talk over the audiences head to trick them into thinking that it's brilliant. it JUST DOESN'T WORK) and all the new characters were perfunctory and grating. Speaking of which, what the hell happened to the Twins in Revolutions? They just vanished! The Architect was SO unecessary, as was his scene with Neo. ugh. i could go on about the rave, blah blah shitty movie. BAD BAD MOVIE. the only bright spot was Hugo Weaving, who seemed to understand you can still have fun in these movies. Revolutions was better than Reloaded. i'll give it that. This doesn't mean i didn't have problems with it, but at least the sense of URGENCY was back in this one. people cared about their fate, and it seemed like something was actually at stake. BUT, this does not explain how someone with a pipe CLEARLY sticking out of their lungs can talk for seven minutes before dying. i enjoyed anything involving Agent Smith or the Siege on Zion in this one, but not much else. and the ending.... ugh!


Once Upon a Time in Mexico - seemed to disappoint a lot of people. I'm not sure why. Well, i suppose because they forgot this was the sequel to El Mariachi and Desperado, or they at the very least didn't bother to double check those movies. really. in the opening credits it clearly says
"A Robert Rodriguez FLICK". this is not high art, folks. this is his attempt to create the spaghetti western in mexico, and it adheres pretty closely. the ads were misleading, yes, playing up the epic nature of it, altering the role of Johnny Depp and leading people to believe Salma Hayek was in the movie more than she was (in reality, she was shooting Frida) but this is nevertheless the over the top wrap up to the El Mariachi Series. While Antonio Banderas, Danny Trejo, Willem Dafoe, Cheech Marin, Ruben Blades, and Mickey Rourke are having a ball, this movie belongs to Johnny Depp. He is utterly brilliant here, twisting a plot device character and giving him the type of quirks you can't help but admire. He steals the show out from everyone (again, but i'll get to that later...) Robert Rodriguez helms it all with a love for his craft and it feels like he's having a grand time with this film, just like..

Spy Kids 3-D - Yes, i freely admit to seeing the Spy Kids films and loving all three of them. Get past the stupid trailers; these are top rate kids films that adults can watch and enjoy too. the use of 3-D in this movie is more organic than i thought, and it boasts a higher rate cast than you'd imagine.. (don't believe me? check this out: Antonio Banderas, Carla Gugino, Ricardo Montalban,
Sylvester Stallone, Mike Judge, Salma Hayek, Steve Buscemi, Alan Cumming, George Clooney, Cheech Marin, Danny Trejo, Tony Shaloub, Bill Paxton, and Elijah Wood) yep, that's someone from every robert rodriguez movie represented. and finally, someone reminds us why people liked Sylvester Stallone! See these movies, i promise they're better than you'd think.

Freddy vs. Jason - If you liked the Friday the 13th series or the Nightmare on Elm Street series, you've already seen this. If you don't like them, don't bother. I mean, you aren't going to like it. If you love your horror tongue in cheek, you appreciate a film that balances both series with affectionate nods in both directions, then Freddy vs. Jason will not disappoint. The kills are better than even Jason X boasted, and despite the fact it's not Kane Hodder under the hockey mask, everything works. Can you pass up seeing Robert Englund as Freddy again?

Willard - Is not like the original. the original Willard was, to be fair, bad. It was cheap and not really scary (however it's not a bad as Ben, the unecessary sequel) This Willard is a very atmospheric black comedy, and you really just can't beat Crispin Glover and R. Lee Ermey on screen (Mulholland Dr fans, do note Laura Herring is in this movie too). Don't expect scares and i predict you'll find Willard is hilarious and evil. plus the dvd has the most informative commentary you will ever hear (for the music video of crispin glover's cover of "ben")

Final Destination 2 - I didn't really watch all of it, to be honest. Adam was drunk and just too entertaining. the death scenes were more gruesome (and inventive) than the first one...

Pirates of the Carribean: Curse of the Black Pearl - was as much fun as you can have at the movies and SOOOO much better than i could've guessed. Anythin based on a Disney Ride automatically breeds suspicion (and later you'll see my theory validated) Orlando Bloom, Kiera Knightley, Johnathan Pryce and Geoffery Rush all do wonderful jobs playing in the shadow of JOHNNY DEPP. just like Once Upon a Time in Mexico, he owns this film. how people forget him year after year baffles me, but the mere fact he's involved in the sequel guarantees i'll check it out. Gore Verbinski has settled himself into steady groove of successful genre films, and more power to him for it (yes, this is how you follow up The Mexican and The Ring, folks) entertaining all around. yarrrr.

Finding Nemo - It's Pixar, folks. Need I say more? The most consistent animated film company hits another one out of the park. Where does it sit with the others? for me, somewhere between Monsters, Inc. and A Bug's Life. Not quite Toy Story or Toy Story 2, but a damn sight better than any other american kid's animation.

The Haunted Mansion - Why? because it was the Haunted Mansion or Gothika, and Mission Valley was closer and cheaper. Yes, it's as bad as you suspect, save for two things: 1) if you like to mercilessly rip into Terrence Stamp (and oh boy, do we) or 2) you want to see a film that ends with a BRIDGE FROM LOUISIANA TO HAWAII. that's right. Terrence Stamp can't honestly believe he's on par with Richard Burton when he's in a film this bad. Eddie Murphy! Get back together with Steve Martin and Frank Oz! Make good comedies. Sheesh...

Bad Santa - Cannot be advertised. You need to understand that. Ads do not do this film justice. It's true, this is the most mean spirited Christmas movie you'll ever see. Bad Santa earns its R rating in the first two minutes of the film, and it's as funny as anything you'll see next year. i promise. Billy Bob Thornton is laugh out loud funny, and you get Samir from Office Space, the MOST pathetic kid in a christmas movie ever, plus Bernie Mac and Tony Cox. From Terry Zwigoff (Ghost World and Crumb) and The Coen Brothers. ok? get crack-a-lackin (ohhhh you idiot terrence stamp...)

Confessions of a Dangerous Mind - Which i believe came out at the tail end of 2002, but i saw this year and couldn't then, so there. George Clooney and Charlie Kaufman turn Chuck Barris's "unauthorized" autobiography into a whirlwind of a movie, and anchoring everything is Sam Rockwell is Barris. This movie sinks or swims on his shoulders, and he handles it so well i'm amazed he's not a bigger star by now. look for him to break out big time soon. Clooney is no slacker his first time behind the camera, either. avoiding digital effects, he uses in camera trickery to pull off the more surreal elements of the storyline. not perfect, but a fine effort.

X2 - aka x-men whatever. the movie i saw didn't have the words x-men united anywhere in it, so i'll just call it X2. an improvement in almost every way on x-men (hey, i said almost, but i'm getting ahead of myself) there are plenty of sly references toward the x-universe and hints of things to come (and judging by box office receipts there will be an x3 and 4, etc) alan cumming is spot on as nightcrawler, and it's always a joy seeing Patrick Stewart and Ian McKellan on screen together. that being said, the fact that it's a chapter in a larger story means that characters are getting spotty at best screen time (whereas Storm suffered in the first film, Cyclops is pushed almost to a cameo in this film, whereas Logan is still the focus. Rogue doesn't do much but react to Iceman and Pyro, and aside from hinting at the Phoenix to come, Jean Grey isn't particularly important to this movie. the beginnings of the brotherhood of evil mutants was cool, plus a pre-fur Beast, Collosus, and indications of Omega Red and Gambit in the future) a solid, if not perfect, second entry. it won't be the weak link in the series i suspect.

Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines - Was so much better than it deserved to be. Ok, i'll admit i had ZERO expectations for this film (James Cameron, Linda Hamilton, Edward Furlong all drop successively out of this project, early word is terrible) it's true, i never saw U-571, so i didn't know if Johnathan Mostow could handle a Terminator film, but when it's not your franchise, how could you? Yes, this movie is alternately derivative and slyly nodding towards the other terminator films (the sunglasses motif was cute, and seeing dr. silberman again was fun) Nick Stahl and Claire Danes do the best they can with the script they've got, and Kristianna Loken one up's Robert Patrick as the T-X, plus the film boasts the bleakest ending of any summer "blockbuster" you're likely to see. it shouldn't have been fun, but it is.

Bad Boys 2 - Is too much of a guy/buddy cop action movie for its own good. two and a half hours of over the top violence, gay bashing, and car crashes is too much. really. if you like seeing endless shots up women's skirts, digging through corpses, bullets flying or repeated jokes about dating someone's sister, by all means, this is your movie. if you want to see joe pantoliano and peter stormare cash a paycheck, this is your movie. if you need to stop thinking and say "wow, that car flipped twice over the boat" or you love flagrant product placement, whooooa is this your film. it is not something i'll be watching again.

Looney Tunes: Back in Action - I didn't like the movie itself, but Joe Dante has a knack for detail and throwaway gags that is unrivaled. Seriously, just read the names of the Spy Movie Posters in Brendan Fraser's house (all starring Timothy Dalton) or the fact that a new Batman being filmed on the Warner lot has Roger Corman directing it. Or perhaps seeing Scooby and Shaggy berating Matthew Lilliard. Or Ron Pearlman. or the Area 52 scene (complete with monsters from Fiend without a Face, This Island Earth, The Day of the Triffids, Dr. Who, Forbidden Planet, Invasion of the Body Snatchers, Them!, The Beast from Haunted Cave and the Man from Planet X) or a scene for scene parody of Psycho's most famous scene. if these things sound interesting to you, see Looney Tunes. otherwise, please don't

Secretary - I can't remember if i reviewed this last year or not. anyway, i'll put it this way for you: it's a more fucked up story about true love than Punch-Drunk Love. Maggie Gyllenhaal needs to stay away from things like Mona Lisa Smile (yes, i just checked imdb, and i came out in 2002, but i don't think i saw it until 2003)

and finally, how can i end this but with the only movie appropriate for such an occasion:


The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen - This is a trainwreck of a movie. first, it's crucial to understand if you like the comic AT ALL, you should avoid this movie. or pretend you never read the comic. please, because the logic leaps made in this disaster will send any rational reader into head-scratching territory. let me begin with the premise of the comic, as it's BASICALLY the same as the movie.

Okay, it's the end of the Nineteenth Century. Imagine, if you will, the Mina Harker, Allan Quatermain, Dr. Henry Jekyll, Hawley Griffin (the invisible man), and Captain Nemo are in fact real and living in different parts of the world. MI-6 (yes, the one that James Bond will eventually work for) recruits them to locate a cavorite capable of defying gravity (from H.G. Wells's The First Men In the Moon) that was stolen by a crime lord. Sherlock Holmes is presumed dead but rumours abound he may still be alive. this is the premise of the first volume of the league of extraordinary gentlemen.

LXG (as the movie will be known from here out) differs in the following ways:

-Allan Quatermain is not an opium addict languishing away in Africa, but a retired legend.

-Mina Harker is a Vampire, rather than just a "scandalized" woman.

-Captain Nemo practices Kung Fu.

-Hawley Griffin is not the invisible man, but rather it's a thief who finds his serum.

-Tom Sawyer and Dorian Gray are added.

ok, some of this is curious (particularly Tom Sawyer, who in the 1890s would be in his 40's or 50's, not a twenty something working for the US Government [why? because the adventures of tom sawyer takes place before the civil war, putting it 30-40 years before the events of this story]) but ok, for the sake of a more "interesting" movie, we take these changes in stride. right? why then would you put Mina Harker in BROAD DAYLIGHT not once but twice?? Why is Dorian Gray suddenly unable to look at his portrait? i will forgive the city of venice for having waterways wide enough for the Nautilus to fit through and streets in which to have a CAR chase (not just a car, but a six cylinder 1930's style rolls royce rip off). Why betray the laws you set up? that's just lazy film making.

to be kind to LXG, there are some cute attempts to copy things from the comics (nods towards previous Leagues, etc) but ultimately the film fails because it can't get around the horrible logic holes it presents. (ok, one more, and that's it. but this one is a doozy. the villain of the film is James Moriarty, who supposedly died with Holmes. ok. same in the comic, except in LXG he's no older than mid-thirties! this is a man who by Doyle's accounts was older than Holmes himself. the movie even goes so far to insinuate it's Rasputin! [yeah, that Rasputin] before some Mission Impossible Pull Away tm makeup reveals the true identity) anyway, the cast seems to realize how rotten this is and hams it up accordingly. and if you're ever planning to use Hyde again, just go digital! please. the prosthetics looked terrible, and the transformation is laugh out loud bad.

anyway, don't see this movie. or do, but make sure you tear it a new one. it won't be hard, believe me.


that's it. i couldn't do any more if i wanted to. perhaps dvds in another one, but for now, you've got your hands full. feel free to respond, critique... oh you know the drill.




* What I could find in the way of "movie reviews" from 2001-2005 were laughable, incoherent, quasi-write ups.

Blogorium Review: Hobo with a Shotgun

The Cap'n has to say that I'm a little bummed that so few people I know are excited about (let alone aware of) Hobo with a Shotgun. The film, which pits a homeless man against a seemingly endless wave of corruption, depravity, and violence in a small town, looks to offer cheap thrills - another homage to the era of exploitation cinema and VHS naughtiness. So does Hobo with a Shotgun deliver on the sleazy simplicity of its title? Read on to find out.

A Hobo (Rutger Hauer) arrives in Hope Town looking for a fresh start, a chance to buy a lawn mower and start his own business. But Hope Town is anything but hopeful: under the grip of The Drake (Brian Downey) and his sons Slick (Gregory Smith) and Ivan (Nick Bateman), people in the city are arbitrarily brutalized and executed. Violence runs rampant, the police have no interest in taking down The Drake, and Hobo finds his only ally in prostitute Abby (Molly Dunsworth). When a pawn shop robbery forces Hobo to choose between his lawnmower and a shotgun, he declares a one-man war on the town, but can he survive when The Drake orders all homeless people to be killed?

When watching a film called Hobo with a Shotgun, one cannot be faulted for forming certain expectations about what one is going to get. Look at the poster to your right, for example: its retro "unfolded" image and "kitchen sink" approach of what you'll see in the film promises a kitschy, uber-violent experience, most likely verging on offensive with gobs of gore, drug use, and prerequisite gratuitous nudity. Sure enough, one would not be mistaken to think all this (and more) is on display in Hobo with a Shotgun, a title of such simplicity it reminds one of Snakes on a Plane. Hold that thought...

The film has an interesting history of its own: Hobo with a Shotgun was the winner of a contest to create your own fake trailer for Robert Rodriguez and Quentin Tarantino's Grindhouse, and because the Blu-Ray took nearly three years to come out, Hobo with a Shotgun's presence on the disc was largely forgotten. Director Jason Eisener and writer John Davies pushed forward with their trailer, a YouTube sensation, and landed Rutger Hauer in the title role.

What began as this:



became this*:



and is now playing On Demand and on the Playstation Network, with a theatrical release in the near future.

Hobo with a Shotgun aims to be a throwback to the politically incorrect, exploitative "trash" films that made up the "video nasties" shelf at your local video store. Like Planet Terror, it goes for the gusto when it comes to ultra-violence; there are kills in this film the Cap'n has never seen before, and I'm no slouch when it comes to murder set-pieces. If Planet Terror was an homage to John Carpenter's 1980s output, then Hobo with a Shotgun is a throwback to the endless variations on Death Wish, particularly The Exterminator. It's also not far off from Rodriguez's own spin-off of Grindhouse, Machete.

If you're looking to get your quotient of "wrong" met, you're going to have a hard time finding it all packed into one film beyond Hobo with a Shotgun: pedophile Santa's, child endangerment, eviscerations, beheadings, hangings, castrations, broken limbs, crooked cops, people being burned alive, a "bumfights"-esque filmmaker, hiding in corpses, burning school buses, ice skate fights, and the Plague - a pair of killers dressed head to toe in homemade armor hired to take out the Hobo. At one point, for reasons best unexplained, the Hobo watches as one member of the Plague fights an octopus. Ivan and Slick are, for reasons also unexplained, 80s themed jock thugs, dressed in "prep" clothing with Tom Cruise slicked hair and a DeLorean.

While this might sound enticing, Hobo with a Shotgun makes the crucial mistake of being relentlessly downbeat from beginning to end. As a result, we as an audience aren't allowed to revel in the trashy violence, cheesy dialogue, or over-the-top performances. Instead, the cumulative effect is mostly a downer; what was fun in Planet Terror or ridiculous in Machete is instead dour, hopeless, and devoid of any of the thrills and chills implied in Hobo with a Shotgun's concept. There are a few chuckles to be had (mostly from the newspaper headlines, my favorite of which was "Hobo Stops Begging, Demands Change") but I'd have a hard time justifying putting Hobo with a Shotgun on during a party. Other than grossing the faint of heart out, its really only going to be a buzz kill. While it isn't boring like, say, Snakes on a Plane, the incessant profanity and unyielding cruelty do damper a "party" atmosphere.

The film's downbeat ending isn't likely to make it a hit with midnight movie crowds, but I think on a one-by-one basis, Hobo with a Shotgun will entertain enough gorehounds and retro-junkies to justify recommending a rental, just don't make it the centerpiece of your own "grindhouse night."

The film is well shot, reasonably well acted by its mostly unknown cast, and has enough going for it that I imagine many of you will enjoy it on some level, but its pedigree as an off-shoot of Grindhouse might lead people to expect a different movie than what you get. Then again, since so many people didn't know Hobo with a Shotgun even existed, you might not have the same expectations I did. While it's no The House of the Devil or Black Dynamite, Hobo with a Shotgun does try to capture a particular slice of genre exploitation, and it's mostly successful which is better than a lot of what's out there.



* If you were wondering, the original Hobo, David Brunt, appears in what amounts to a cameo as a crooked cop.

Retro Review: Taxi Driver

Editor's Note: Like many Retro Reviews, this piece contains SPOILERS which may impact your viewing enjoyment. By all means, watch Taxi Driver first (now available on Blu-Ray and low priced, to boot) before diving in.

Taxi Driver and the Cap'n go back a ways: arguably Martin Scorsese's "best known" film*, Taxi Driver was one of the first movies I had a VHS copy of (okay, literally a "copy," as in from one I rented), and sat comfortably on the tape next to Shaft. At the time, I enjoyed watching Robert DeNiro's slow descent into insanity, his isolation feeding a misplaced sense of rage, until his explosion of violence takes out a few low level pimps (notably Harvey Keitel) and he becomes an even more misunderstood hero for "rescuing" Jodie Foster's teenage prostitute. I didn't really understand Taxi Driver's place in the film noir tradition, or the influence of post-Vietnam rage and disillusionment, but I appreciated the gritty, forthright story, the embittered voice-over of Travis Bickle, and the ambiguous ending.

The violence also appealed to me in high school, although Taxi Driver is more about attitude than actual outbursts. I've seen the film so many times now that I can't actually remember how I felt about the lack of violence for most of the film (unlike Shaft, which I distinctly recall being underwhelmed by), but I can only imagine the bloodbath that closes the story made up for the mis-communication between characters for the bulk of Taxi Driver's 113 minute running time.

It was only later, when I came back to Taxi Driver after years of simply taking the film on a surface level, that I had the opportunity to rediscover the film in context. Considered by many to be the first major "Neo-Noir**," a spin-off of the Film Noir period of the 1940s and 50s, Taxi Driver both borrows from and expands upon themes of the movement (crime stories based around a down-on-their-luck antihero, a femme fatale, and a profound sense of angst, suspicion, and impending doom).

In an essay for my Film Noir final, Taxi Driver was a central piece when dealing with a shift in "noir" protagonists from "morally ambiguous" to a "psychotic and suicidal impulse," a shift that occurred in late noir and reaches its apex (arguably for the last time) in Scorsese's film:

Where Taxi Driver becomes the “watershed” noir for the psychotic action and suicidal impulse lies within Travis’s inability to do anything but destroy (himself or others). Bickle is, to put it simply, a weapon without a direction to point in. His disgust with New York is exacerbated by driving all over the city at night and dealing with the very worst it has to offer. In his spare time he stews, going to porno theaters without release or stewing at home, a veritable sty of fast food and garbage.

Travis Bickle does not have a femme fatale to draw him in, so he creates two: Betsy, a campaign volunteer for Senator Charles Palantine, and Iris, a child-prostitute. His “Madonna/Whore” complex becomes the catalyst for a purpose, although in both cases it is wholly destructive. Travis alienates both women, but directs his anger at the men they represent.

Without any interest for his own well-being, Bickle pushes forward to realize his goal of being a psychopathic killer. His rage at Betsy redirected at Palantine, Travis comes to believe that his act will have major repercussions, fixing a world he has no use for (and evidently no cure for). When he fails, instead of trying to adjust his mindset, the suicidal Bickle storms into the brother where Iris stays, killing Sport, her pimp, his boss, and the john with Iris in an outburst of blood and severed limbs.

Bickle, who sustains injuries in the shoulder and the neck, fully intends to kill himself as Iris screams beside him. Her salvation was not part of his plan, if he truly had one, and a lack of ammunition is his salvation, though he clearly has no use for life. The police, storming into the aftermath of Travis’s rampage, find him “shooting” himself in the head with his finger. Bickle, the suicidal psychopath, has finally lost it.

If there is any question that the epilogue to the film, which finds Travis back in good health and lauded as a “hero”, sullies this climax, consider the final moments of Taxi Driver. Bickle, who appears back to “normal”, drops Betsy off in his taxi and drives away. He catches something in the reflection behind him, and the “normal” façade drops. Adjusting the mirror, Travis sees only himself. His rehabilitation was not complete; the cycle will begin again, and next time it may not end happily.

A curious side effect of the psychotic action hero occurs less in neo-noir and more to this day in action films like The Punisher or Death Wish. The lone hero, which traces itself back to pre-noir detective films and has its own watershed moment with Dirty Harry, is a spin-off of this psychotic action and suicidal impulse. It continues to appear in neo-noir or noir pastiches like Sin City, but the current crop of post-classical directors seem to be more fascinated with revisionist takes on pre-1950s noir conventions.

I include this because of an ongoing argument about whether its ideal to enjoy a film on its own merits or if there is a greater benefit to understand a film beyond what is simply presented onscreen. I contend that there is a healthy middle ground, one that doesn't require a film school degree to "appreciate" classic films, but one that does provide audiences with a new lens with which to revisit old favorites.

Is it absolutely necessary to know everything in the italicized paragraphs above to enjoy Taxi Driver? Certainly. I would be the first person to concede that one needn't know what a "pastiche" is to "get" the film. On the other hand, there's something about seeing Taxi Driver's place in film history that does enrich the experience, that opens new questions about the film, about specific camera angles, editing choices, or snippets of dialogue. While I'm not forcing anyone to consider these new ways to experience a film, my own history with Taxi Driver is an example of growing with film, of seeing an essentially unchanging piece of art in another way, and of the knowledge that the relationship between audience and film is constantly evolving. For me, that's what being a film fan is all about.



* What else falls in there: Goodfellas? The Departed? The Last Temptation of Christ? Casino?
** Not to be mistaken with a sort-of arbitrary association of "Post-Noir" that covers films like Touch of Evil, Blast of Silence, Point Blank, and Ace in the Hole.

A Typical Blogorium Conversation.

Lost Reviews

I found these the other day while I was cleaning out files. I wrote all of them for a radio show I was working on five years ago, and looking at the reviews, I can't imagine why most of them were abandoned. Oh wait, yes I can. You try reading them out loud.

A Dirty Shame2004
Directed by John Waters

Highly touted prior to its release as the first opening NC-17 film to be advertised on television, most people missed A Dirty Shame during a brief theatrical run, and it was largely forgotten. What a shame, because John Waters most recent effort accomplishes something many thought impossible; A Dirty Shame walks the tightrope between his older, more graphic fare (Desperate Living and Pink Flamingos) and his more recent “harmless” films (Hairspray, Cry Baby, and Pecker).

Tracey Ullman heads up the film as the uptight Sylvia Stickles, a woman who is so embarrassed by sexuality that she locks her daughter Ursula Udders (played by Selma Blair) in her room to conceal her outrageously augmented mammaries. Sylvia’s world is turned upside down, however, when she’s struck on the head and becomes a ravenous sexual lunatic, with the guidance of Ray Ray Perkins (played by Johnny Knoxville with all the swagger of a young Elvis Presley.) Ray Ray introduces Sylvia to the underground culture of sexual fetishism in Baltimore, and reveals that she is the prophet sent to them who will usher in the next level of carnal experience.

While it sounds awfully filthy, A Dirty Shame is actually quite funny, and doesn’t dwell on fetishism (which includes dressing up like a baby, smearing food on yourself, or the “bears”) but plays with the notion that sex is unnatural. The film is largely inoffensive, with the exception of a scene where Sylvia picks up a bottle of water using her you know what in a nursing home, but even that is more in the spirit of fun and less about shock value.

Waters peppers the cast with great character actors, including Chris Isaak, the aforementioned Ullman, Blair, and Knoxville, but also uses his regular troupe, among them Patricia Hearst, Mink Stole, and Jean Hill, plus an eleventh hour surprise cameo from a certain Bay Watch veteran.

A Dirty Shame is nothing to be embarrassed about watching; if you’re so inclined, I’m sure there’s a lot you can learn about in this movie, and at 87 minutes it hardly overstays it’s welcome, and anyway, it’s a hoot. A warning to hankie grabbers: the film’s NC-17 rating exists for the same reason Clerks initially got it, which is to say there’s a lot of talk but not much action.

*note – for those not inclined to be seen renting a movie rated NC-17, an R rated cut exists, but director Waters admits it’s entirely made of alternate scenes and is utterly harmless, and therefore maybe too tame.

Primer
2004
Directed by Shane Carruth

What a first glance appears to be a cautionary tale about the dangers of abusing science, Primer is actually the sort of brain-bending science fiction that rewards multiple viewings, and you won’t mind because a) it’s only 77 minutes long, and b) the film grows richer and richer with each reveal.

The film begins in earnest with four engineers trying to get their company up and running with something new and revolutionary to the scientific community. As time passes on, two of them slip out of the picture, and the remaining fellows make a radical discovery; they’ve found a way to transport matter six hour backwards in time. They continue to experiment, and then one of them presents the other with a larger surprise: he’s created one that a person can fit in.

At first they use it to make a small fortune using stock market numbers, and then their plan begins to spiral out of control when their ambition exceeds their conscience. What makes Primer work is that we’re treated to science fiction in a realistic way: none of this seems too implausible or outside the realm of what could happen, and the ensuing chaos and unraveling of layers may be confusing at first, but the more you pay attention to, the more fascinating this film is.

First time director Shane Carruth made Primer on a practically non-existent budget, shooting digitally with available light and casting himself and his friends, and while the low budget is on display insofar as film quality, the movie itself gains a grainy realism that would ring hollow in a major studio production.

This is certainly worth picking up and watching once, and if you like it or just wondered “what the hell happened?” give another sit through. You won’t regret it.

Trees Lounge
1996
Directed by Steve Buscemi

A movie lost in the shuffle of the indie revolution, Steve Buscemi’s directorial debut is a confident, laid back look at a man who has nothing worth living for. Consider Trees Lounge as a counterpart to Buscemi’s role in Ghost World, but imagine that instead of spending his money on arcane jazz records, he went over and over again to wean himself of the teat of the local bar. Every town has one; the watering hole where the same faces sit day in and day out, slightly drunk and ready to tell you about the good ole days.

Trees Lounge is the name of the bar in this particular corner of celluloid America, and Buscemi (who also wrote the film) plays Tommy, a local boy who never grew up. His girlfriend left him for his old boss, and he spends most of his time drifting about in the hours between opening and last call. Eventually, he gets a job as an ice cream truck man, and meets a much younger girl (played by Chloe Sevigny, fresh off her role in Kids) and one thing leads to another, but without such dire consequences. After all, this is a man with little ambition, and the outcomes are as muted as his outlook on life.

This is not to say Trees Lounge is boring; quite the opposite. The film is an amusing dramedy about being adrift and getting ahold of your life, but as opposed to most coming of age stories, this one happens to be about being in your late thirties. Buscemi fills the bar and surrounding town with plenty of familiar character actors, including Seymour Cassel, Mark Boone Junior, Anthony LaPaglia, Debi Mazar, and Samuel L. Jackson.

Don’t go in expecting anything flashy, but Trees Lounge is a fine character study from a character actor who knows what he’s doing.

Coffee and Cigarettes
2004
Director Jim Jarmusch
It isn't difficult to digest this movie. In fact, the title alone tells you everything that can be expected. Jim Jarmusch takes small groups of people (for most of the vingettes, two) and provides them cigarettes and, well, coffee. However, let me clarify something here. This isn't improvised, or at least, most of the conversations aren't. Too many little phrases and moments echo each other to be an accident (in particular, keep an eye out for musicians who double as doctors, nikolai tesla, and the shady nature of celebrity.) While Coffee and Cigarettes is slight, the segments are never too long to grate, and the really good ones make up for the lesser bits.

To wit:

-Cate Blanchett is a standout playing herself and her cousin, as are Alfred Molina and Steve Coogan in the same beat.

-The White Stripes discuss Jack's Tesla coil while Cinque Lee looks on (Lee, having appeared in an earlier segment with his sister Joie and Steve Buscemi)

-Iggy Pop and Tom Waits test each other and discover the diner's jukebox doesn't play either one of them.

-Bill Rice and Taylor Mead muse about the late seventies and champagne
and, in what's probably the most heard about segment, The RZA and The GZA offer Bill Murray helpful tips of losing that smokers cough (they also refer to him exclusively as "Bill Murray".)

See what I mean? There's really not a lot after the movie ends, but it's a pleasant hour and a half, and even if the Tom Waits / Iggy Pop scene goes on for far too long, and Roberto Benigni is almost impossible to understand in his scene with Steven Wright, well, it's entertaining enough. Jarmusch fans should enjoy it well enough, and it may appeal to other cinephiles.

Garden State
2003
Director Zach Braff

If there's one problem with Garden State, it's that the movie is too easy to love. This, understandably, is a minor problem, but waiting a few days between watching it and writing this tone my love of the film considerably.

Don't get it twisted, this is a great movie. Zach Braff put together something truly magic here: We're not just talking Wes Anderson's The Graduate (which, incidentally, is Rushmore), but at the same time, comparisons to Anderson are well made. Braff has a great eye of frame composition. Every shot is full of eye catching detail. And he's got a natural chemistry that makes him easy to relate to.

Admittedly, this isn't the most original idea for a movie, but you really don't mind seeing a movie about finding yourself and true love in the midst of tragedy because of how magnetic the cast is. Along with Braff, Ian Holm brings a subdued, nervous performance of a man who just doesn't understand his son, the always reliable Peter Sarsgard plays the affable loser that wants nothing more to smooth things over so well you tend to forget just how good he is at it. Then there's the revelation: Natalie Portman. I'd been so used to seeing her go half-assed in Star Wars that I forgot that this was the same Natalie Portman that blew everyone away in Leon. She's a force of nature in Garden State, but it's a testament to her talent that she never takes it over the top. This is the type of character that'd tempt some to go way past believable, but you never feel like she isn't a real person (even if that real person is a chronic liar who suffers from siezures. Speaking of which, kudos to Braff for avoiding the easy dramatic device of the free spirit heroine being dragged back to earth with a tragic seizure scene)

Garden State works because everyone involved wants it to, and where most movies would drag or take the easy route, things work so very well because we're invested in the characters.

* I should take a moment to talk about the music. My friend scoffed at my interest in Garden State, calling it "an advertisment for how awesome indie rock is" which, from the tv ads for the soundtrack, isn't that far off base. However, the movie, despite using indie rock as an almost excluse soundtrack, only directly draws attention to the music once. I think it's not as obtrusive as some might expect it to be (think of it as a more subdued version of Simon and Garfunkel's "Graduate" soundtrack)

DiG!

Ondi Timoner’s documentary about The Dandy Warhols and The Brian Jonestown Massacre was a seven year labour of love, telling the tale of two bands on the rise; one of who makes it to (relative) success, and the other who implodes. The great joy in watching the film is seeing how each band approaches their rises and falls, and what it takes to stay alive inside the belly of the record company beast. While Warhols singer Courtney Taylor narrates the film, equal time is given to the Dandys and Anton Newcombe, the brilliant but unstable leader of the Jonestown Massacre. The bands pick at each other, are envious, and get together every now and then to play (or in one case, to crash the other band’s house for a photo shoot) but it’s not necessary to like The Dandy Warhols or The Brian Jonestown Massacre to enjoy the film. Better still, the dvd contains separate commentary tracks for each band, so we can hear their reaction to the film, how they’re portrayed, and how they saw things as 1996 turned into 2002.

Me and You and Everyone We Know

Director Miranda July moves from the world of short films to full length with this confident slice of life dramadey. Well, let’s take a step back, eh? July, who appears in the film, made a film that is at times evocative of Wes Anderson, Paul Thomas Anderson, Mary Harron, Sofia Coppola, and Terry Zwigoff, with the themes of a Todd Solondz movie. Yes, that is possible, and Me and You and Everyone We Know is a declaration of emerging talent wrapped up in the overlapping stories of a Short Cuts or Magnolia. A warning to the sensitive: this film deals with burgeoning adolescent sexuality, but not in a perverted way, per se.

Z Channel: A Magnificent Obsession

Z Channel was a pay cable station based out of California in the late seventies and early eighties, but it’s what Z Channel and its founder Jerry Harvey were about that makes it so important. Z Channel preceded HBO in a number of ways, but more importantly, Harvey was interested in showing movies that didn’t get a fair shake in theaters; films he loved personally and wanted to share with the world. Z Channel was the first cable station to show movies the way they were shot, in widescreen, and in blocks with similar films for marathons. Directors like Robert Altman, David Cronenberg, and Jim Jarmusch saw their films alongside movies like The Magnificent Ambersons, Heaven’s Gate, and Once Upon a Time in America, premiering for the first time in its original director’s cut. Harvey had a passion for films, and the people interviewed in this film rave about him, the least of which is Quentin Tarantino, who lived outside Z Channel’s broadcast range and only saw it through bootlegged tapes. Harvey’s life was cut short in the mid-eighties when his mental problems drove him to suicide, but the impact of Z Channel on what we know as home video cannot be overlooked, and A Magnificent Obsession is a great way to see that.

The Chumscrubber

The Chumscrubber is a bit like Donnie Darko, but with the sensibilities of I Heart Huckabees. There’s our hero who lives in a semi-permanent prescription stupor, his clueless parents and their clueless friends, and then there’s The Chumscrubber, and omnipresent video game, tv, and comic book character who wanders through post apocalyptic suburbia with his severed head at his side. To tell you any more would take away the fun of seeing it for yourself, but don’t expect another Donnie Darko. Just something distantly related.

The Life and Death of Peter Sellers

Stephen Hopkins cut his teeth in Hollywood making sequels to popular sci-fi and horror movies (A Nightmare on Elm Street Part 5, Predator 2) but in 2004 he made something quite different for HBO, something that, while critically recognized, never got the attention it deserved, The Life and Death of Peter Sellers. Based on the book of the same name, Geoffery Rush is Peter Sellers, whoever that is. The film gives us Sellers as a man without any identity of his own, partly the reason he was such a renowned character actor, because he slipped into the roles fully. Jealous to the point of acting childish, Sellers was a fascinating mess of a man and the movie covers his personal and professional life in a way many were never aware of. That and it’s damned good, too. Rush is fantastic as Sellers, who plays the movie as though he’s directing his own life story (and playing all the parts), and there are fine turns by John Lithgow, Stephen Fry, Emily Watson, Charlize Theron, and Stanley Tucci as Stanley Kubrick. A fine post modern biopic in the vein of American Splendor, The Life and Death of Peter Sellers is a must view.

The Machinist

Brad Anderson’s curious blend of the worlds of David Fincher and David Lynch may be best known for Christian Bale’s stunning weight loss, but it’s a hallucinatory trip down the dark corridors of the mind that keep us watching. Bale, who dropped down to 117 pounds, plays Trevor Reznik, a machinist who hasn’t slept for a year and is haunted by ominous visions of something he may or may not have done. As his sense of reality begins to unravel, he reaches out to the only people he knows, a waitress (Aitana Sánchez-Gijón) and a hooker (Jennifer Jason Leigh) who may know him better than he knows himself. If the ending lacks the punch it should have, then at least the journey there was effective enough.

The Jacket

Steven Sodebergh and George Clooney’s production company turned to short filmmaker John Maybury to direct their first major feature, a strange blend of Jacob’s Ladder and One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest. Adrien Brody is a Desert Storm veteran who’s suffering more than a little brain damage from being shot in the head twice, and when the man he’s hitchhiking with kills a police officer, he can’t remember what happened. Assigned to the care of Dr. Thomas Becker (Kris Kristofferson), Jack Starks is subjected to a horrific series of tests in a mental facility, the worst of which involves being put into a straight jacket and locked in a morgue container under the influence of heavy medication. Starks awakens to find himself in the future, and by accident comes across a young woman (Keira Knightley) whose mother he helped out in 1990. When Starks discovers his death is imminent, his mission is a race against time to find out how he dies and if he can stop it. The Jacket benefits greatly from Maybury’s vision as a director: much of the film’s transitions have a Brakhage like feeling, and he has a fine eye and a great cast to sell the premise.

Wet Hot American Summer

Somewhere between when The State ended it’s run and when Stella began airing on Comedy Central, the central members got together and made a movie about summer camp in the 1980’s. Their bizarre sendup, written by Michael Showalter and directed by David Wain, has all the flourishes of the summer camp film genre, but filtered in such a strange way that we’re almost not sure if it’s funny the first time through. It is. Wet Hot American Summer is the only kind of movie we could expect from The State, a comedy troupe so devoted to the bizarre that it’s no wonder the show didn’t last. In addition to the half of the state that isn’t in Reno 911, Wet Hot American Summer also stars Paul Rudd, Janeane Garafalo, David Hyde Pierce, Amy Poehler, Elizabeth Banks, and Christopher Meloni (also known as the guy who looks like Elias Koteas). Don’t be surprised if you find yourself watching it and saying “hey! It’s that guy” more than once, even if you aren’t sure if you like it. Watch it a couple of times and let it sink in.

The Most Dangerous Game

While King Kong was wrapping up shooting and before effects work went underway, RKO decided to put the standing jungle sets to good use and make another movie they could release before Kong, using much of the same cast, crew, and even the same director. Based on Richard Connell’s story of the same name, The Most Dangerous Game is the tale of a trophy hunter who survives a boat capsizing and finds himself of an island owned by the mysterious Count Zaroff, who also enjoys hunting, but in a very different way. Starring Joel McRea, Leslie Banks, and Kong’s Fay Wray and Robert Armstrong, the film is a lean 63 minutes, but never runs out of steam. Do yourself a favor and hunt this one down.



Heavenly Creatures

Peter Jackson’s first foray outside the world of horror comedy was the true story of Juliet Hulme, who brutally killed her mother with the help of her best friend Pauline Parker. Though it sounds right up his alley, Heavenly Creatures is more of a drama with the hint of fantasy than an outright suspense film (the murder itself happens at the very end of the film). The movie proper deals with the growing relationship between the shy Hulme (Melanie Lynskey), and the outgoing Parker (Kate Winslet, in her big screen debut), much to the horror of their parents. Jackson displays an adeptness with the young actresses heretofore unseen in his earlier films, and brings the fantasy elements of their dream world (involving butterflies, castles, and clay knights) to the screen in a way that doesn’t feel hokey. Heavenly Creatures was the first indication to many that Jackson had much more in him than Zombie films, but it never got the audience it deserved.

F for Fake

Orson Welles’ free form film essay on the art of sleight of hand, be it magic, forgery, or film illusion is a wild ride that benefits from watching with a skeptic’s eye. While it seems Welles is pointing the camera at Elmyir, a master art forger, perhaps he’s looking at the man’s biographer, who also wrote a biography of Howard Hughes that turned out to be utter fiction. Or perhaps he’s pointing the camera towards his companion Oja Kodar, and her sordid tale involving Pablo Picasso. Maybe he’s pointing at himself and his critics, who chided him for never finishing his films. Maybe. Watch it for yourself and decided, and while you’re checking out Criterion’s first class dvd of F for Fake, put in disc two and watch Orson Welles: One Man Band, a feature length documentary about a number of films Welles began, but for one reason or another, never completed. The master is at work in F for Fake, so go see what he’s up to.

Nope.

No April Fool's Day joke review here.

I was shocked too.

Blogorium Review: Paul

I must admit I felt a twinge of sadistic glee reading online reviews of Greg Mottola's Paul when the film finally made its way to theatres two weeks ago (it opened in the United Kingdom last month): "geek" friendly sites were falling all over themselves trying to find nice ways to pad the disappointment of what seemed to be a great idea: Simon Pegg and Nick Frost write a movie about two geeks that run into an alien while touring famous "UFO" landmarks, and then star in the film with Seth Rogen as the alien, directed by the man who made Superbad. The phrases "feel good geek movie" and "hard to pin down tonally" didn't help trailers that already made Paul look less than appealing, so in a cruel way, I felt vindicated in not wanting to see the film.

But clearly I did see Paul, or this review would be happening on Friday (check the date) and probably masking another review, like last year*. Standing on the other side of the film, I understand the reviews attempts to soften high expectations from its target audience, but I think that many critics didn't quite set their disclaimers up in the right way. Paul is actually a pretty good movie, but you have to wait a little while before that's clear.

Graeme Willy (Simon Pegg), a comic book artist, and his best friend Clive Gollings (Nick Frost), a science fiction writer, have made the pilgrimage from the UK to the San Diego Comic Con, the geek mecca. They've also rented an RV in order to travel the Southwest in search of major alien landmarks (Area 51, Roswell, The Black Mailbox), but when a car whips around them and crashes on the road, they unwittingly become accomplices in the escape plan of Paul (Seth Rogen), an alien trying to get home after a long stint as prisoner of the United States government. On the lam, they inadvertently pick up Ruth Buggs (Kristen Wiig), a fundamentalist Christian that believes Earth is only 4,000 years old. Pursued by Agent Zoyle (Jason Bateman) and two junior agents, Haggard (Bill Hader) and O'Reilly (Joe Lo Truglio), who work for the mysterious "Big Guy," as well as Ruth's father Moses Buggs (John Carroll Lynch), our unwitting heroes race to return Paul to a rendezvous point before it's too late...

The film's biggest problem is that the introduction of Paul doesn't really work. That Seth Rogen plays Paul isn't the issue: it's that Paul IS Seth Rogen for the first fifteen minutes or so that we see him. Rather, Paul is the same kind of character type that Rogen gravitates towards, and his introduction in the film is more distracting than effective. It doesn't help that many of the jokes involving Paul rely heavily on vulgarity (anal probing, alien nudity) or obvious nods to other "first contact" films - to this I have to disperse the blame evenly between Pegg and Frost's script and Rogen's delivery, neither of which help Paul find its way early on.

Frost and Pegg do a fine job of setting up the world of the film (as do Bateman, Hader, and Lo Truglio) but Paul seems "off" in the character dynamic. Part of it is the wildly uneven comic tone, including a running joke about whether Graeme and Clive are gay that doesn't go anywhere. It's not something I can really pinpoint in one scene, but the film doesn't regain its footing until Kristen Wiig's character is introduced; suddenly the interpersonal relationships make a little more sense, Paul moves into the background (somewhat) or at least isn't the load bearer for comedy in the film. Wiig's understated delivery actually helps settle down Rogen's over-the-top delivery as Paul, and the way the says "because of his blasphemous theories" was the first big laugh I had in the film (the second really big one was the discovery of Agent Zoyle's first name).

Paul throws so many "geek" references at the wall that I can't possibly mention all of them, but not only can you expect several nods to Close Encounters of the Third Kind, Star Wars, Star Trek, Predator, Mac and Me, The X-Files, E.T., and Aliens (the last two prominently featuring people involved in the films), but there's also Clive and Graeme's conversing in Klingon, a Wilhelm scream, two separate Indiana Jones references, a Back to the Future joke, a redneck bar version of the Cantina from A New Hope, and a clever way for Pegg and Frost to address a question raised in Shaun of the Dead (hint: it involves dogs).

Early in the film, the references seem more forced, which doesn't help the struggling first act to find its footing. That's also coupled with the bulk of the cameos in the film, including Jane Lynch, David Koechner, Jesse Plemons, Jeffrey Tambor, and (KINDA SPOILER) the voice of Steven Spielberg - part of a scene that's so obvious I wish it hadn't made the final cut. Reviews seemed to think it was a big deal not to reveal that Sigourney Weaver was the mysterious voice that Agent Zoyle is talking to, but if that's the case then why can you clearly hear her in the trailer? I didn't think that was supposed to be such a surprise, to be honest, unless you've never heard her speak before.

Because I feel you're probably thinking that I didn't like Paul, it's important to mention that despite the bumpy first half, I found myself really engaged by the midpoint and actually rather enjoyed the film by the end. If the first section of the film is trying too hard, once the film finds its footing, Paul is actually quite good and something I wouldn't hesitate recommending. I would warn you that it isn't that the film is uneven or that the "geekery" comes hard and fast (to be fair, half of the characters in the film really don't get the whole "Comic-Con thing" and that there's a running joke involving no one knowing any of the books Tambour's character wrote), but that the film is so front loaded that you might be tempted to tune out.

Don't. Stick around until Kristen Wiig shows up, and Paul improves tremendously. The chemistry within the cast finally "clicks," the jokes shift in direction (including a push towards ridiculous bursts of vulgarity, many coming from Ruth's inexperience with cursing), and the evolution of Bill Hader's Haggard from loser to obsessed psychopath is worth the price of admission. Jason Bateman is pretty fantastic playing the "straight man" role; Pegg, Frost, Lo Truglio and Wiig are all great, and when Rogen settles down it's easier to tolerate Paul as a character. By the time that Blythe Danner appears as the adult version of a child we meet early in the film, I was completely on board with the film.

Paul is a better movie at the end than the beginning, which I suppose is a shame, because if it had the consistency in the first half that it does in the second, then it could be something really special. As it is, it's pretty good, a three-and-a-half star out of five kind of movie; you'll have a good time, and will probably rent it and watch it on TV, but won't run out to buy it in a few months. Then again, it is nice to see a movie that tries to entertain and mostly succeeds when far worse movies can't be bothered to do either week in and week out.



* You didn't really think I watched New Moon, did you?

Retro Review: Day, Land, Diary, and Survival of the Dead

Hey, so back before that whole Dead Man / Human Highway thing, when I was still planning on covering George Romero's "Dead" films? You know, the one I teased after writing about Night of the Living Dead's 30th Anniversary the varied history of Dawn of the Dead on home video? Yeah, I didn't either; the Cap'n totally forgot about that, and here we are at the end of the month of March, staring down four (well, five) movies that fit into the "March of the Dead" moniker I came up with and abandoned for no apparent reason. The good news is that individually, I don't know how much more I could say about Diary and Survival of the Dead, my history with Day of the Dead and Land of the Dead don't have much in the way of anecdotal stories, which leaves me with one story to tell about Zack Snyder's Dawn of the Dead remake*.

I suppose I saw Day of the Dead on VHS, shortly after renting Night of the Living Dead and Dawn of the Dead, although my earliest impressions of the film are scant: the opening - that desolate street somewhere in Florida (?) that flooded with zombies (and a crocodile), the hands through the wall gag that Romero uses to both call back to Dawn of the Dead, but also to twist around our expectations of "reality." I also remember the machete to the arm, Bub, the zombie torso reduced to almost nothing but a brain, the holding pen, and the even more upbeat ending on a tropical island.

Subsequent visits to the film, on DVD and Blu-Ray reminded me how much the military vs. science debate plays into the film, but also how less simplistic I remembered the film being - I always seemed to wander into Day of the Dead thinking that Joe Pilato's Rhodes is a cartoon cut-out villain, only to discover that Rhodes is at his wit's end in the film. His soldiers have been assigned to protect the scientists, who assured the government (or what existed of it before Day of the Dead begins) that they would find a cure. Dr. Logan (Richard Liberty) is more interested in rehabilitating the dead one by one, and when he starts pilfering military corpses, the soldiers reach the breaking point.

I understand that Day of the Dead is the least "imminently watchable" of Romero's first zombie trilogy, and it's not rewarding or packed with goofy moments like Dawn of the Dead, but with time I've found that I like the film more and more. Oh, I never saw the remake. Sorry.

Land of the Dead was long awaited, and the Cap'n was not the only person excited to see Romero return to his stomping grounds, and while the excitement was palpable, I still had nagging doubts while I continued telling others how "awesome" the film was. It wasn't the setting, or even most of the story, which I really like: a world where the dead have completely taken over, where humanity is rebuilding but not on their terms, and the film was a glimpse of how people would adapt once they lost the proverbial "zombie war."

I liked the extension of Bub's evolution, crossed with the reason the dead wandered into the Monroeville Mall, into a slowly developing sentience among some of the living dead. Was Big Daddy a little silly? Yeah, maybe it does sound like he's saying "Duuuuude!" when he growls, but there was something to him teaching the butcher zombie to cut down that wall, or the way he organized the dead to avoid simply being slaughtered. Romero hit the reboot button after Land of the Dead, so we never saw where that evolution would head, but not even that is the sticking point for why I have trouble sitting down watching Land of the Dead from beginning to end.

The problem, as I can surmise, is the cast: everyone seems to be giving the film a "B" movie effort when Romero is clearly trying to make the most of major studio backing. Simon Baker seems to be trying, so does Asia Argento, but I can't get past John Leguizamo and Dennis Hopper play variations of characters they play all the time. Robert Joy's Charlie is another matter entirely, a character I only hate slightly less than Scott Wentworth's professor in Diary of the Dead.

When Professor Murder and I went to see Snyder's remake of Dawn of the Dead, we ran into some mutual friends who were there to see the other movie we considered seeing, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. Perhaps our allegiance to zombies sent us to Dawn of the Dead first, then later to Michel Gondry and Charlie Kaufman's memory-wiping romantic drama; either way, we swapped our reasons for seeing the respective releases, then went to see the subtext-free, fast-zombies, not-afraid-to-be-nihilistic-ending remake of one of the most admired horror films in the last fifty years.

If that quick succession of descriptors makes it sound like I didn't enjoy Dawn of the Dead, I'm afraid I'll be disappointing you. Of the remakes made starting with The Texas Chainsaw Massacre and, well, yet to end but one can hope with how awful the A Nightmare on Elm Street butchering, I put Dawn of the Dead up there with The Hills Have Eyes and Piranha as one of the better re-visiting's of horror films. Yes, it essentially lacks substance, but Snyder does manage to create momentum, slow it down and drain out hope, re-instate it, and then send everything to hell again during the closing credits. It remains the only film by Zack Snyder that I like, let alone enjoy, and while it may be Dawn of the Dead lite, I'll take it over what Platinum Dunes vomits into theatres every spring.

Honestly, I've said all I can say about Diary and Survival of the Dead in my reviews: I haven't watched either film since, and I did honestly try to take the films on their own terms instead of pre-judging the films. They're both terrible, obvious, and at times thunderingly stupid, all the while failing to generate the slightest amount of tension, scares, or decent performances. Is it possible I'll come back to them down the line, as I did with Day of the Dead, and appreciate more? It would be nice, but somehow I don't see that happening.

Sorry to end March of the Dead on such a dour note, but Romero's second trilogy is almost uniformly underwhelming, a pale reflection of his first three "dead" films. Romero is currently working on another "dead" film, and while I've burned my hand two-and-a-half times, hope wins out over being jaded. There's always the chance of recapturing the old "magic." In the meantime, that's the history the Cap'n has with Night of the Living Dead, Dawn of the Dead, Day of the Dead, Land of the Dead, Dawn of the Dead ('05), Diary of the Dead, and Survival of the Dead.



* For Tom Savini's Night of the Living Dead remake, please go here. For the wretched 3D remake, go here.