Recently, I took a quick drive up to Cleveland, OH, which was my first time in the prominent Great Lakes city. Admittedly, I only knew as much as the internet had told me of it.
As I usually do when exploring a new city, I set aside some time to hunt for film-related used media: soundtrack records, DVDs, VHS, laserdiscs, etc.
One of my stops in the city was a trippy little record store called A Separate Reality, which initially stuck out to me due to its prominent eyeball logo.
While A Separate Reality doesn’t have any movies among its considerable inventory, this is the kind of record store I always hope to find. The selection of vintage soundtracks was as massive as it was eccentric, featuring everything from science-fiction classics to italian horror flicks to blaxploitation legends to children’s films. The selection included so many notables that I’m only going to spotlight only a handful of them here, and recommend that people check this place out on their own.
The Exorcist II: The Heretic
The Exorcist II is one of the most infamous Hollywood failures of all time, and a movie I have covered on the blog before. However, it also features a score from famed composer Ennio Morricone, who recently (finally) won an Academy Award for The Hateful Eight. However, if you are a fan of his work on movies like The Thing, Once Upon A Time In The West, or Once Upon A Time In America, you might be in for a shock with his score here. It’s…well…distinct.
City of the Living Dead
City of the Living Dead is a 1980 film by Lucio Fulci. The score was composed by Fabio Frizzi, a frequent Fulci collaborator who also provided music for his films A Cat In The Brain, The Beyond, and Zombie, as well as the bizarre 1977 Italian version of Godzilla by Luigi Cozzi.
Hercules
Hercules is a 1983 movie directed by Luigi Cozzi for Cannon films, and stars Lou Ferrigno as the legendary demi-god. Even if you haven’t seen this movie, you may have been exposed to the infamous clip of Ferrigno throwing a bear into outer space. I did a full write-up on this bizarre movie a while back, and I highly recommend it.
The score for Hercules was provided by Pino Donaggio, who is probably best known for his work with Brian De Palma (Carrie, Blow Out, Raising Cain, Body Double, Dressed To Kill) and Joe Dante (Piranha, The Howling).
Americathon
Americathon is a strange relic of a movie, that could only possibly come from 1979. It is a satiric future vision of a United States dominated by Jimmy Carter and liberals, with a focus on environmentalism to the detriment of private business and the national debt. It is a weird window into an America before the Reagan presidency, and looking at it now is kind of bizarre. There is a whole lot of xenophobia and racism baked into this feature, and it doesn’t seem to have much of a point to it, but from a socio-political lens, it is an interesting movie to observe.
I first caught this movie at the 2016 B-fest in Chicago, and it is one of the features that has most stuck with me. However, that is admittedly mostly because Meat Loaf fights a car in it. The politics are kind of interesting too, though. The soundtrack includes tracks from The Beach Boys, Eddie Money, and Elvis Costello, among a handful of others, which makes it somewhat notable.
Today’s feature is one of the lesser films to be based on a Michael Crichton work: 2003’s Timeline, directed by Richard Donner.
The plot of Timeline is summarized on IMDb as follows:
A group of archaeological students become trapped in the past when they go there to retrieve their professor. The group must survive in 14th century France long enough to be rescued.
Timeline is based on a novel written by Michael Crichton, who is best known for Jurassic Park, Congo, WestWorld, The Andromeda Strain, and E.R.. However, the screenplay adaptation for Timeline was penned by Jeff Maguire (Gridiron Gang) and George Nolfi (Sentinel, The Bourne Ultimatum, Ocean’s Twelve).
The director for the movie was Richard Donner, who is known for such features as The Toy, Superman, Superman II, The Goonies, Scrooged, and Lethal Weapon.
The cast of Timeline includes Paul Walker (The Fast and The Furious, The Skulls, She’s All That), Gerard Butler (Reign of Fire, Dracula 2000, 300, The Ugly Truth, Olympus Has Fallen), David Thewlis (The Island of Doctor Moreau), Anna Friel (Limitless), Neal McDonough (Minority Report), Billy Connolly (The Boondock Saints), and Frances O’Connor (Windtalkers).
The cinematographer on the movie was Caleb Deschanel, whose other credits include Killer Joe, Winter’s Tale, The Patriot, The Right Stuff, National Treasure, and The Passion of the Christ.
The editor for Timeline was Richard Marks, who has cut films like The Godfather: Part II, The Hand, Broadcast News, Serpico, Pretty In Pink, As Good As It Gets, and Julie and Julia over his career.
The music for the feature was provided by Brian Tyler, whose other credits include Simon Sez, Dragonball: Evolution, The Expendables, John Dies At The End, and Iron Man 3.
Apparently, Michael Crichton so hated the film adaptation of Timeline that he ceased licensing out his properties for the rest of his life, which unfortunately ended only a handful of years later.
The actors David Thewlis and Anna Friel met while working together on Timeline, and were romantic partners for many years afterwards.
Timeline experienced a number of behind the scenes issues. It was initially supposed to release in 2002, but was delayed after the studio was unsatisfied with Richard Donner’s cut of the film. The film had to be entirely re-cut twice more, which led to the entire Jerry Goldsmith score having to be replaced with one by Brian Tyler, due to Goldsmith’s failing health.
Initially, the role eventually filled by Gerard Butler was offered to James Bond actor Pierce Brosnan, who turned it down.
A third writer, Frank A. Cappello (Suburban Commando, Constantine), was at one point credited for film. He apparently wrote an entire draft of the screenplay, and was even credited on some of the film’s early promotional materials.
The battle at the center of Timeline‘s plot is entirely fictional, though the overarching conflict of The Hundred Years War was very much real. A number of liberties are taken with historical accuracy, as you might expect, including some intentionally anachronistic insignias placed in the background as Easter eggs. One of these is the Quebec flag, which appears on a shield as a nod to the filming location.
Financially, Timeline was a significant loss. On an $80 million production budget, the movie only grossed just under $44 million theatrically, leaving the production significantly in the red.
Critically, Timeline fared equally as poorly. Currently, it holds a 5.6/10 IMDb user rating, and Rotten Tomatoes aggregate scores of 11% from critics and 45% from audiences.
Roger Ebert was one of the more charitable critics of the lot, giving the film a 2 star review. However, his criticisms echo much of the negative reaction to the feature:
“I felt too much of the movie consisted of groups of characters I didn’t care about, running down passageways and fighting off enemies and trying to get back to the present before the window of time slams shut…Just once I’d like to see a time-travel movie inspired by true curiosity about the past, instead of by a desire to use it as a setting for action scenes.”
As Ebert stated, one of the biggest weaknesses of the movie is the un-enthralling cast of characters. The interpersonal relationships and individual characters are all incredibly forgettable, to the point that some are only distinguishable based on their accents. Part of this is due to the cast just being unnecessarily large, to the point that the characters don’t get the space to develop on screen. As far as the dialogue and characters go, this movie is roughly as fleshed out as a lesser Friday the 13th sequel: individuals are only as identifiable as stereotypes, and only exist to be arrow fodder.
Plenty of fans of the source material have complained at length about changes to the screenplay, but I tend to let those kind of details slide: movies need to fit a more compressed medium, and writers and directors have the right to put their own creative stamps on things. So, for this movie, I’m not going to delve into those.
One of the more widely-mocked sequences from the movie involves the English army launching a volley of “night arrows” at their enemies. I remember this from the first time I saw this movie as a kid, and I definitely recall it not making any sense. “Night arrows” are not a thing: they are just normal arrows, shot at night, that aren’t on fire. The fact that characters act like this is some some of tactical brilliance is absolutely baffling to me, and I’ve never figured out just why that sequence was included.
Overall, Timeline is a way cooler idea than an actual movie. The weak casting and writing certainly didn’t help matters, but I’m not sure if this movie would have resonated with audiences even if everything fired on all cylinders. Even if Donner’s initial cut was a masterpiece, I don’t think a time travel movie set in this particular time period was going to excite anyone. The Hundred Years War just isn’t something that clicks for people in general at this point, let alone your average American audience. If you want to mess with time travel, go to the dinosaurs, go to Rome, go to the Revolution, go to the Civil War, go to a recent 20th century decade, or go to the future. Some time periods are just more cinematic and intriguing than others for Hollywood, and I don’t think this time period makes the elite cut as far as options go for blockbusters.
As far as a recommendation goes, I found this movie to be incredibly dull and forgettable, and I’m hard-pressed to think of any redeeming qualities. Outside of seeing Gerard Butler in his long-hair period, or Paul Walker doing his damnedest to be a leading man, there’s not much worth seeing here.
Recently, I took a quick drive up to Cleveland, OH, which was my first time in the prominent Great Lakes city. Admittedly, I only knew as much as the internet had told me of it.
As I usually do when exploring a new city, I set aside some time to hunt for film-related used media: soundtrack records, DVDs, VHS, laserdiscs, etc.
My first stop in Cleveland was Blue Arrow Records, located in the Waterloo Arts District, and surrounded by buildings adorned with street art and sculpture gardens. It definitely has a cool vibe to it, synthesizing a hip and eccentric interior with an anachronistic external aesthetic, punctuated by the eponymous neon blue arrow.
As far as the selection goes, Blue Arrow is a pure record store, and there aren’t any significant wayward VHS or DVDs to be found hiding out on their shelves. However, they do have a not-to-shabby collection of soundtrack records, of which a number caught my eye.
To Live And Die In LA is a 1985 crime movie directed by William Friedkin, the lauded New Hollywood auteur who helmed The French Connection and The Exorcist. In many ways, To Live And Die In LA is an attempt to re-capture the success of The French Connection, with a distinctly 1980s flair. One of the keystones of that 1980s aesthetic that Friedkin wanted for the film was the soundtrack, which is provided in entirety by the band Wang Chung. Seriously. Of course, when I saw this soundtrack on the shelves at Blue Arrow for $3, it absolutely went home with me.
I recently saw To Live And Die In LA for the first time, which was spurred on after reading William Friedkin’s autobiography. While it is a bit uneven, the movie is well designed, well acted, features one of the greatest car chases in film history, and is at least partially responsible for the rise of Willam Dafoe. It is a pretty good time, subverts the tropes and expectations of the genre, and deserves a second look (to say the least). The Wang Chung soundtrack is just the cherry on top of an already pretty damn cool movie, and I highly recommend seeking it out.
Over The Top is a 1987 Canon feature starring Sylvester Stallone that I covered on the blog some time ago. I regard this as a must-watch for bad movie fans, and it encapsulates a lot of what makes late 1980s cheese-ball flicks what they are. The soundtrack for the film is no exception, featuring such acts as Asia, Sammy Hagar, Kenny Loggins, and Sylvester Stallone’s brother, Frank Stallone.
Assault on Precinct 13 is the movie that explosively introduced the world at large to John Carpenter. I personally still regard it as one of his best movies, and perhaps the most iconic siege thriller ever put to film. As with most of Carpenter’s films, it also features a synthesizer score created by the director, which is defined by simple rhythms and haunting drones. I like the score to Assault on Precinct 13 almost as much as the movie itself, and would have picked it up if it hadn’t been so expensive. There’s just no such thing as cheap John Carpenter vinyl these days.
Today’s feature is the 2013 Ryan Reynolds and Jeff Bridges buddy cop flick, R.I.P.D..
The plot of R.I.P.D. is summarized on IMDb as follows:
A recently slain cop joins a team of undead police officers working for the Rest in Peace Department and tries to find the man who murdered him.
The director for the film was Robert Schwentke, whose other credits include RED, Flightplan, and The Time Traveler’s Wife.
R.I.P.D. is based on a Dark Horse comic book originally created by Peter Lenkov, who also penned the screenplay for Demolition Man, and has done a fair amount of writing and producing on television. The three other credited writers for the movie were David Dobkin, director of Fred Claus and Wedding Crashers, and the writing duo of Phil Hay and Matt Manfredi, who penned Aeon Flux, The Tuxedo, and Ride Along.
The editor for the movie was Mark Helfrich, who also cut Red Dragon, Season of the Witch, Hercules, Rush Hour, Predator, Scary Movie, Showgirls, and Revenge of the Ninja.
The score for the film was composed by Christophe Beck, who has provided music for movies like Ant-Man, Get Hard, Frozen, We Are Marshall, and The Tuxedo, among a handful of others.
The cinematographer for R.I.P.D. was Alwin H. Küchler, who has shot a batch of other high-profile movies, which includes Steve Jobs, Sunshine, Hanna, and Divergent.
The cast for R.I.P.D. is headlined by Jeff Bridges (Hell or High Water, The Big Lebowski, Starman) and Ryan Reynolds (Deadpool, The Voices, Green Lantern), with supporting roles filled in by Kevin Bacon (Cop Car, Tremors, Super, Friday The 13th), Mary-Louise Parker (Weeds, RED, Red Dragon), James Hong (Big Trouble In Little China), and Stephanie Szostak (We Bought A Zoo, Iron Man 3).
During a reddit Ask Me Anything thread, Jeff Bridges commented that he enjoyed making R.I.P.D. with the cast and crew, but attributed the film’s ultimate failure to studio interference. Specifically, Bridges stated that “the suits just cut it against the grain, and I thought, screwed it up”.
Apparently, Zach Galifianakis was originally cast as Roy Powell (the role eventually taken by Jeff Bridges), but had to drop out due to scheduling conflicts.
The reception for the movie was generally negative. It currently hold a user rating of 5.6/10 on IMDb, along with Rotten Tomatoes scores of 13% from critics and 38% from audiences. Financially, it also significantly disappointed: it was made on a production budget of $130 million, on which it only grossed $78.3 million in its worldwide theatrical run.
In my opinion, Reynolds and Bridges are both pretty solid in this movie: they are both talented comedic actors, but despite that, they can’t significantly elevate the material that they were given for this flick. That said, they are the sole forces in the movie that make it watchable and entertaining to any degree. Bacon and Parker also fill in good supporting roles, and round out a decent cast. In particular, I have one hell of a soft spot for villainous Bacon. As far as casting goes, I just wish that there was more James Hong, who won my admiration forever with Big Trouble In Little China.
As far as negatives go, and there are plenty, the thing that stands out most are the effects. Particularly for 2013, the visual effects are incredibly bad, and I’m not quite sure why. Either corners were cut with the budget, or the project as a whole was dramatically rushed. There are moments where the CGI gave me flashbacks to early 2000s movies like Van Helsing or LXG, which is totally inexcusable for a movie outside of the SyFy Channel. The effects were distracting enough to snap me out of any engagement I had with the story, which was limited to begin with.
This brings up another big problem: there isn’t enough time spent in the world created in this movie. The characters never seem to get past the most superficial level of depth, and even the R.I.P.D. institution itself is only shown in passing. Reynolds, who should be the audience’s avatar to the supernatural world, is never properly introduced to his new surroundings, so the audience isn’t either. I understand that the movie wanted to avoid hand-holding, and maintain a chaotic mystique to the world, but the result here is a little too hands-off. There at least needed to be a better establishment of the R.I.P.D. itself early on, much like the Men In Black organization is introduced in that movie.
Speaking of which, I think the comparisons to MIB that have often been bandied about when talking about R.I.P.D. aren’t entirely justified. Supernatural initialisms aside, R.I.P.D. is fairly distinct from M.I.B. for a handful of reasons that might not be noticeable at first glance. First and foremost, the central partner relationships in these two movies are quite different. In MIB, Will Smith is a hammy fish-out-of-water who brings most of the comedy to the table via his misunderstandings, mishaps, and unique perspective. Tommy Lee Jones is mostly a stone-faced straight-man, though quite a good one, and his comedy comes from his nonchalance in the fact of absurdity. In R.I.P.D., the duo is only similar to MIB insofar as one is old and experienced, and the other is new to the force. Reynolds’s character is more of the straight half of the duo, and is in many ways bound by his contemporary law training. His comedy, if you can call it that, comes from the frustrations of adapting to a new set of rules and a new, unfamiliar bureaucracy. Bridges plays the ham: though he has tons of experience as an officer, he is still distinctly anachronistic, which is the source of a lot of the humor around his character. He is still casual in the face of absurdity, but it doesn’t define him in the way that it does Jones in MIB. Really, R.I.P.D. is more complicated than MIB in most ways, but certainly not better for it. MIB keeps characters, concepts, and institutions outlandish, but ultimately simple and digestible.
R.I.P.D. isn’t good by any stretch: the effects are awful, the dialogue is iffy, and the story isn’t terribly engaging, but it isn’t nearly as bad as I thought it would be from the critical response. The cast really saves it from being an unwatchable disaster, but only just. If you are a Ryan Reynolds or Jeff Bridges fan, you probably wouldn’t regret the time spent watching this flick.
Today’s feature is one of the most unnecessary and inexplicable sequels in movie history: Mannequin 2: On The Move.
The plot of Mannequin 2 is summarized on IMDb as follows:
A young department store intern falls in love with a female store mannequin who is really a peasant girl fallen under a thousand year spell. She comes to life whenever he removes the cursed necklace from her.
Mannequin 2 was directed by Stewart Raffill, whose other films include Tammy and the T-Rex, Mac and Me, and The Philadelphia Experiment.
The handful of writers involved with Mannequin 2 included Edward Rugoff (Mr. Nanny, Mannequin), David Isaacs (Critical Condition, Cheers), Ken Levine (Frasier, M*A*S*H), Michael Gottlieb (Mr. Nanny, Mannequin), and Betsy Israel, who has no other listed credits.
The primary cast of the film is made up by Kristy Swanson (Deadly Friend, The Phantom), William Ragsdale (Fright Night, Fright Night Part 2, Left Behind), Meshach Taylor (Mannequin, The Howling), Terry Kiser (Weekend At Bernie’s, Weekend At Bernie’s II, Friday the 13th Part VII), and Stuart Pankin (Fatal Attraction, Striptease, Arachnophobia).
The music for Mannequin 2 was composed by David McHugh, who also provided music for The Dream Team, Mystic Pizza, and Moscow On The Hudson, among a handful of others.
The estimated budget for Mannequin 2 was $13 million, on which it only grossed a minute $3.8 million in its theatrical run, making it a significant financial failure. Critically, it didn’t fare any better: it currently holds an IMDb user rating of 4.0/10, alongside Rotten Tomatoes scores of 13% from critics and 41% from audiences.
Mannequin 2 is a bad movie to be sure, but there are some weirdly redeeming qualities here. First and foremost, the cast seems like they totally bought in on the inherent goofiness of the concept, and they all exaggerate their roles in a way that the movie at least remotely entertaining. Also, there are a lot of issues I had with the first film that are mostly rectified here. For instance, characters are more realistically weirded out by the concept of someone fucking a mannequin, which was missing in the first movie. Also, despite the humor still mostly missing the mark, I feel like the deliveries and performances are actually better in this sequel. Particularly, I thought Terry Kiser got a great opportunity to mustache-twirl with this flick, and absolutely owned it. Likewise, both leads are at least more relatable and likable in this movie, even if they are not quite as deep as a standard kiddie pool.
Something that is particularly strange about this film is the lack of actual mannequin screen time. For most of the film, the curse that creates the eponymous mannequin is actually lifted, which in a lot of ways is good: it allows both that character and her relationships to develop in a realistic way. However, it also drifts pretty far from the concept of the movie: this is more of a time travel love story or Sleeping Beauty concept than a movie about a mannequin. Honestly, that is probably for the best at the end of the day.
Overall, despite Mannequin 2 being immensely campy and weak in the humor department, I think it is actually a pretty decent remake of the original movie, if not a good sequel. Honestly, the two movies are connected in total by a single line of dialogue, and I think this movie primarily focuses on trying to fix issues with the first movie and re-imagine the concept. On a level, it works: I think the movie is better than the first because of that effort. However, it is still an atrocious, if watchable, comedy movie.
If you like campy humor, then you might just be surprised by this movie. I think there is a reason why these movies have a cult following: they master a specific niche kind of humor that doesn’t resonate with most audiences. For people that can find the value in the movie, I think it is a pretty good time. For almost everyone else in the universe, this movie is just yet another bad, dated comedy movie. However, bad movie fans should definitely give it a look.
Today’s feature is a b-grade buddy cop classic: 1991’s Showdown In Little Tokyo.
The plot of Showdown in Little Tokyo is summarized on Rotten Tomatoes as follows:
Dolph Lundgren stars as police detective Chris Kenner, an American raised in Japan. He is given a new partner, Johnny Murata (Brandon Lee, making his Hollywood debut), a Japanese raised in America. The two are made for each other — Chris doesn’t appreciate American culture, while Johnny doesn’t much like Japanese culture. One thing they both enjoy are the martial arts, of which they are experts. The two are assigned to L.A.’s Little Tokyo, trying to nab the notorious Yoshida (Carey-Hiroyuki Tagawa), a drug manufacturer using a local brewery as his distribution center.
Showdown in Little Tokyo was directed and produced by Mark L. Lester, who was also behind movies such as Class of 1999, Class of 1984, Commando, Roller Boogie, and Firestarter.
The two writers for the film only have a handful of other credits between them, most notably a couple of episodes of Dragnet and a television adaptation of The Watsons Go To Birmingham.
The cinematographer for Showdown In Little Tokyo was Mark Irwin, who shot Scream, Scanners, Videodrome, The Fly, Class of 1999, RoboCop 2, New Nightmare, Kingpin, and Steel, among many, many other well-known features.
A total of four editors wound up putting in work on Showdown in Little Tokyo: Michael Eliot (Maniac Cop 3: Badge of Silence), Robert A. Ferretti (Tango & Cash, Rocky V, Die Hard 2, Gymkata), Steven Kemper (Face/Off, Timecop), and Stuart Baird (Demolition Man, Lethal Weapon).
The musical score for the movie was provided by David Michael Frank, whose other credits include Poison Ivy, Suburban Commando, Out For Justice, Hard To Kill, and Best of the Best II.
The cast for Showdown In Little Tokyo is primarily made up by Dolph Lundgren (Rocky IV, The Punisher, I Come In Peace, Johnny Mnemonic), the late Brandon Lee (Laser Mission, The Crow), Tia Carrere (Wayne’s World, Kull The Conqueror), and Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa (Mortal Kombat, Vampires, The Phantom).
Showdown In Little Tokyo suffered from a significant amount of studio interference, primarily in the form of mandated edits to the final product. Likewise, even before the movie was shot, the screenplay went through a number of different forms. The experience burned director Mark Lester out on working in the studio system, leading him to take on smaller, self-funded projects.
The public reception for Showdown In Little Tokyo was generally negative. It currently holds Rotten Tomatoes ratings of 29% from critics and 51% from audiences, alongside an IMDb user rating of 6.0. Likewise, the movie certainly didn’t set the box office on fire: it brought in well under $3 million in its theatrical release, on a estimated production budget of $8 million.
I was introduced to Showdown in Little Tokyo pretty recently. For whatever reason, it has never been on my b-movie radar, and I have absolutely no idea why. As far as cheap, b-level action movies go, this is about as good as it gets. Not only does this movie showcase a classic buddy-cop formula, but the fights are entertaining, the antagonist is more than sufficiently hammy, and all of the players seem to be having a great time with the material. I’m a huge fan of this particular era of Dolph Lundgren, as he took on some damn entertaining projects, and gave performances that I think easily out-class contemporaries like Stallone or Schwarzenegger, and Showdown is no exception.
There is one aspect of Showdown In Little Tokyo that definitely makes it stand out from the field of similar action flicks: outside of perhaps Tango & Cash, it is the most homoerotic entry into the buddy cop genre.
Showdown in Little Tokyo doesn’t bill itself as a gay action film. And like most action movies, that doesn’t do much to disarm just how amazingly queer it is. I mean, we’re talking about a movie where a muscular blonde guy spends entire scenes clad in nothing but black leather hot pants and men compliment each other on the exquisiteness of their dicks
That excerpt is no exaggeration, either. In one particularly notable moment in the film, Brandon Lee tells Dolph Lundgren that he has “the biggest dick I’ve ever seen on a man,” and the script and performances are both laden with slightly more subtle references to the two men having a potential attraction.
Much like with Tango & Cash, it isn’t totally clear if this angle was intentional on the part of the writer/director team (though the penis line seems pretty blatant). Regardless, the chemistry of the subtext adds a lot of entertainment value to what is already an amusing, saturated-with-machismo buddy-cop feature.
I can’t recommend Showdown In Little Tokyo highly enough. Not only is the action good, but the performances are memorable, the plot is over-the-top, and even the costuming got a few chuckles out of me. This is the pinnacle of a specific type of b-movie film-making, and it’ll take you on a time-traveling trip to a bygone era. The comedic performance of Brandon Lee brings up a lot of questions of what might have been if the fates had taken another turn, and Lundgren is still in his top form here. The homoerotic angle of the films adds a whole extra layer of entertainment value, whether it is read as intentional and subversive, or just hilariously oblivious on the part of the creative team. Either way, I think it is hard not to find something to enjoy on a re-watch of Showdown in Little Tokyo.
Today’s feature is 1986’s Critters, which is not at all a knock-off of the 1980s classic, Gremlins. Not at all.
The plot of Critters is summarized on IMDb as follows:
A race of small, furry aliens make lunch out of the locals in a farming town.
Critters was co-written and directed by Stephen Herek, who went on to make The Mighty Ducks, Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure, Mr. Holland’s Opus, Holy Man, 101 Dalmatians, and Don’t Tell Mom The Babysitter’s Dead, among others. His co-writer for the movie was Domonic Muir, who also wrote The Gingerdead Man and the first three Evil Bong movies.
The director of photography for the movie was Tim Suhrstedt, whose long list of credits includes Idiocracy, Little Miss Sunshine, Office Space, Men At Work, Teen Wolf, Mystic Pizza, and Mannequin.
Critters was edited by Larry Bock, who also cut movies like Breakin’, Alligator, Joysticks, Final Justice, Bring It On, The Mighty Ducks, Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure, and The Santa Clause over his career.
The creature effects for the movie were provided by Chiodo Brothers Productions, whose members also worked on Robot Jox, Critters 2, Demolition Man, Critters 3, Carnosaur, Critters 4, Team America: World Police, Screamers, Killer Klowns From Outer Space, Ghoulies, RoboCop 2, and Theodore Rex, among many others.
The visual effects work for Critters was done by two outfits: Fantasy II Effects, which has gone on to work on Moonrise Kingdom, Vampire in Brooklyn, Hellboy, The Core, Last Action Hero, Aliens, and Tremors (and more) in the years since, and Quick Silver FX Studio, which also did Eliminators and Invasion Earth: The Aliens Are Here before apparently dropping off the radar.
The music for Critters was composed by David Newman, who went on to score numerous films, like Death To Smoochy, The Brave Little Toaster, Heathers, Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure, Hoffa, Jingle All The Way, Galaxy Quest, Throw Momma From The Train, Matilda, The Phantom, Ice Age, and The Spirit, among many, many others.
Critters stars Billy Zane (Titanic, The Phantom, Brotherhood of Justice, Demon Knight), Dee Wallace (The Howling, Cujo, E.T.), Billy Green Bush (The Hitcher, Five Easy Pieces), Scott Grimes (E.R.), and Lin Shaye (Pledge This, Kingpin).
Financially, Critters made a decent profit, grossing just over $13 million domestically on an estimated $2 million budget.
Critters received a generally negative response from both critics and audiences. Currently, it holds Rotten Tomatoes scores of 57% from critics and 45% audiences, along with an IMDb user rating og 6.0/10.
Interestingly, one of the handful of critics to give Critters a seal of approval was Roger Ebert, who gave the movie 3 stars:
…what’s interesting is the way the movie refuses to be just a thriller…What makes “Critters” more than a ripoff are its humor and its sense of style. This is a movie made by people who must have had fun making it.
Personally, I agree with Ebert on this to a point. The fact that Critters doesn’t play itself as a straight monster movie does set itself out from a lot of other science fiction, but it also feels very Gremlins. The fact that the monsters here aren’t as emotive or intriguing as their higher-budget cousins doesn’t help, either: they are a little too similar, and Critters doesn’t come close to matching the quality of the humor, gore, dread, or nostalgic awe on display in Gremlins.
I think Critters probably plays better today, with a fair amount of distance from its cohort films like Ghoulies and Gremlins, than it did on its initial release. A lot of the aspects that drew unfavorable comparisons back then feel more like homages than ripoffs when you watch it today. That said, no amount of time or distance passed is going to make this movie good. There are definitely some comedic highlights, but the uneven performances and stilted dialogue hinder the movie as a whole. I will say that this makes for a pretty even waypoint between Leprechaun and Gremlins when it comes to the scale of success of horror-comedies, so it could certainly be a lot worse. Also, the eponymous Critters themselves aren’t too shabby: there are some moments of really excellent puppet work.
If you are looking for a little 1980s flashback, this is a decent movie to serve that purpose. It isn’t great, or even terribly memorable, but it is entertaining enough to justify your time.
Today’s feature is Creepshow 2, the 1987 sequel to the hit anthology horror film, Creepshow.
The plot of Creepshow 2 is summarized on IMDb as follows:
Three more bone-chilling tales that include a vengeful wooden Native American, a monstrous blob in a lake, and a hitchhiker who wants revenge and will not die.
Creepshow 2 was directed by Michael Gornick, who served as George Romero’s director of photography on Martin, Dawn of the Dead, and the original Creepshow. However, Creepshow 2 is his only feature-length directing credit.
The movie’s screenplay was written by George Romero, who directed the original Creepshow (as well as influential horror films like Night of the Living Dead and Dawn of the Dead). Interestingly, he didn’t have any hand in the writing of Creepshow, as Stephen King penned the screenplay. While King did lend material for Creepshow 2, he was not involved with the sequel’s screenplay writing process beyond that.
The special effects and makeup effects team for the film provided early credits for Greg Nicotero and Howard Berger, who have each had distinguished careers in the decades since, working on films and television shows like Kill Bill, Inglorious Basterds, The Hateful Eight, Drag Me To Hell, Sin City, Breaking Bad, and The Walking Dead.
Tom Savini, who provided the effects for the original Creepshow, returned as a consultant for this sequel, and appears on screen as the host between segments.
The stars of Creepshow 2 include George Kennedy (Cool Hand Luke), Tom Savini (From Dusk Til Dawn), Stephen King (Creepshow), Daniel Beer (Point Break), and Lois Chiles (Moonraker).
Apparently, Creepshow 2 was initially intended to have 5 sequences, just like its predecessor. However, budget constraints led to two sequences being cut. One of them, “The Cat From Hell,” eventually made it on screen as part of Tales From The Darkside: The Movie, which many consider to be the spiritual successor to Creepshow 2.
In 2006, a Creepshow 3 was released without any involvement from George Romero or Stephen King. The fan reaction, predictably, was overwhelmingly negative. However, its release was so limited that most fans of the franchise aren’t aware of its existence.
The reception to Creepshow 2 was generally negative, and paled significantly in comparison to the original. It currently holds an IMDb user rating of 6.0/10, alongside Rotten Tomatoes scores of 39% from audiences and 33% from critics.
Creepshow 2 took in an estimated $14 million in its total lifetime theatrical release. While this was profitable given its $3.5 million budget, it was hardly a blockbuster smash.
The biggest burden that Creepshow 2 has to carry is the baggage of its namesake. Honestly, I think this is a pretty decent horror anthology movie, but it so fails to live up to the affectionate detail and loyalty of the original Creepshow, that it is actually made worse by bearing its name.
The original Creepshow is fun, funny, and did a whole lot on a very small budget, thanks to a scrappy, independent crew. Creepshow 2 was expected to match it with a fraction of its budget, a director without a track record, and without the direct help of Stephen King on the screenplay. From the onset, the die was cast for Creepshow 2 to be a disappointing sequel.
Yet, while it certainly isn’t as good as Creepshow, Creepshow 2 could certainly have been a lot worse. Most of the makeup effects actually look quite good in spite of the budgetary limits, thanks in large part to folks like Howard Berger and Greg Nicotero, who were still making names for themselves as quality and innovative effects workers. The writing is probably the weakest aspect of the movie, but I suspect this is the result of the last 2 sequences being cut out of the film: they needed to make up that time somewhere, so they padded out the existing features. Unfortunately, the result is that all 3 remaining vignettes feel bloated as all hell, and the pacing of the film as a whole suffers for it.
Creepshow 2 desperately misses a bunch of the little details that really defined the original movie, too. While there is an attempt to recreate the animated transitions, the result isn’t creepy as much as it is cartoony and goofy, and the style just seems a bit off. Likewise, there is a limited attempt to re-capture the creative and vivid lighting work from the first film, but it is definitely minimal. The dramatically limited death sequences from Creepshow, for instance, don’t make a return.
I think the key to enjoying Creepshow 2 is to manage expectations, and ignore its title. When stacked up against Creepshow, it just can’t compare. However, I think it is better than similar anthology films like Cat’s Eye, and is worth checking out for horror fans, at least for the effects work. However, that does come with a massive caveat.
There is something that absolutely has to be mentioned about this movie: it features the most egregiously inappropriate and unnecessary sexual assault I have ever seen in a major motion picture. During the segment “The Raft,” two characters (a woman and a man) are trapped on a raft in the middle of a lake, set a-siege by a flesh-eating blob that floats on top of the lake’s water. By the time night falls, both of their respective partners have been eaten by the creature, and they decide to take shifts to keep watch. During the male’s shift, he decides not to watch the monster, but to kiss and fondle his fellow trapped acquaintance in her sleep, which leads directly to her death via his negligence.
There are so many things wrong with this, that it is hard to know where to start. First off, pragmatically, it was also in his interest to keep an eye on the killer monster lurking mere feet away, rather than assault his fellow captive. Secondly, from a writing standpoint, there was no established precedence for the action: the character was never shown in a negative light, or revealed to have salacious intent towards the woman. The action is completely out of nowhere, and turns the character into something totally different than he was established as: a cautious, science-obsessed quasi-dork who plays second fiddle to an alpha jock friend. Last but not least, what the ever-loving fuck was the point of it? This kind of casual sexual assault is way too common throughout the genre, and contributes to the genre as a whole having a reputation as a tone-deaf dudes’ club. Particularly without any kind of story or character justification, this was clearly just thrown in for the hell of it, and was even tossed into the movie’s trailer to boot. The ultimate result of the sequence is that the monster is able to sneak up on the pair, which would happen anyway if they had just fallen asleep of exhaustion. It isn’t like there wasn’t an obvious alternative here.
If Creepshow 2 were absent that short sequence, I could confidently recommend it to people. As it is, however, it merits that caution.
Today’s feature is an ambitious remake of Alfred Hitchcock’s Lifeboat, with a science fiction twist: 1993’s Lifepod.
Lifepod was directed by the well-regarded character actor Ron Silver, who is best known for movies like Timecop and The West Wing. However, it was his only directorial feature over his career.
The screenplay adaptation for Lifepod is credited to producers Jay Roach and Pen Densham, who each have a handful of television writing credits for shows like Space Rangers and Poltergeist: The Legacy.
The cast for Lifepod includes director Ron Silver, Robert Loggia (Over The Top, Scarface), and C.C.H. Pounder (Face/Off, RoboCop 3), among others.
The score composition for the movie was done by Mark Mancina, who was in a bit of a transitional period at the time. Before Lifepod, his credits included primary low-budget fare like Space Mutiny. Following Lifepod, however, he got the chance to dictate the music on some much larger productions, such as Speed, Speed 2: Cruise Control, Bad Boys, Twister, Con Air, Tarzan, and Training Day.
Alan Baumgartner served as the film’s primary editor, whose credits since include comedies like Zombieland, Meet The Fockers, and Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story, as well as more recently acclaimed movies like American Hustle, Trumbo, and Joy.
Lifepod was made specifically for television broadcast, and was first debuted on June 28, 1993 on Fox. It currently holds an IMDb user rating of 5.9/10, which, while far from stellar, could certainly be much worse.
The plot of Lifepod is summarized on IMDb as follows:
Lifepod chronicles the trip of eight passengers after the ship they were traveling on blew up on Christmas Eve. Immediately people start dying. The passengers begin to investigate why the ship blew up and how it relates to them.
Remaking a Hitchcock movie well is a difficult task to say the least: some could argue that even Hitchcock himself wasn’t very good at it (I personally prefer the first Man Who Knew Too Much). So, when I first heard about the oddity that is Lifepod, I knew I had to check it out. Shifting the setting and genre for a remake can yield interesting results, and distance the remake enough from the original that it isn’t judged as harshly as it could be. On top of that, these kinds of shifts can allow the writers and director a little more creativity with the material.
In the case of Lifepod, I think that this source material is uniquely suited to this particular re-imagining. The similarities of being lost at sea and being adrift in space are notable, and the interpersonal tensions intrinsic to the story are universal in such a way that the temporal setting doesn’t impact their potency: betrayal is just as shocking and painful in the 30th century as in the 20th.
Lifepod isn’t a masterpiece by any means. Not only are there some mediocre effects and performances, but the pacing isn’t great, and the music doesn’t do a very good job of building the necessary tension to make the story really punch. That said, there are enough compelling moments to make this movie worth watching, beyond its gimmicky value as a Hitchcock remake in space. Silver in particular gives a memorable performance, and the cast (for the most part) play pretty well off of each other. The set design is also pretty decent, though I wish the pod had more of a claustrophobic feel to it: it is hard to tell just how big it is throughout the movie. In general, however, this is definitely a stand-out as far as television movies go.
Today’s flick is a little-known 1999 feature from the infamous library of Full Moon Entertainment: the amazingly-titled Murdercycle.
Murdercycle was distributed by Full Moon Entertainment, an outfit run by Charles Band that is infamous for b-level horror movies like Castle Freak, Demonic Toys, and Dollman, and notoriously terrible franchises like Puppet Master, The Evil Bong, and The Gingerdead Man.
Apparently, Murdercycle was created from the remnants of an unrealized Charles Band project from back in the days of Empire Pictures, which would have involved motorcycles battling each other in something called Battle Bikes. However, it didn’t get made before Empire folded, and Band went back to the drawing board years later under his new Full Moon label.
Between the director and two credited screenwriters for the movie, only one of them has any other credits to his name: writer Neal Marshall Stevens, who used his frequent pseudonym “Benjamin Carr” for the project. His other credits include Retro Puppet Master, Hellraiser: Deader, and Thir13en Ghosts, along with a handful of other low budget horror films.
The plot of Murdercycle is summarized on IMDb as follows:
A meteor falls to earth near a secret CIA military hideout and merges with a motorcycle and it’s rider to create an alien soldier bent on recovering an alien artifact. Military soldiers with the help of a female doctor that can read minds try to figure out what is going on and how to stop it before it kills them. They are also hindered by the CIA agent in charge of the base who refuses to divulge the hideouts’ secrets which could help them.
At first glance, Murdercycle seems to have all of the required elements for a fun b-movie. Honestly, I was sold on the title alone. A killer motorcycle? How could that be boring?
I went into Murdercycle without any other background than that. Based on the title, I thought of a few directions the movie might go. It could be a story like Death Proof or The Hitcher, about an unhinged biker who builds a rig equipped with blades, explosives, and gadgets for terrorizing people on the road. Or, maybe the motorcycle is just operating itself for purposes of mischief and murder, like a Maximum Overdrive or Killdozer situation. Either way, I would have been more than content.
Instead, Murdercycle has very little to do with the titular vehicular manslaughterist (which, as it turns out, is an alien that absorbs technology). The movie is, weirdly enough, a bit of a character drama, and spends a lot of time focusing on betrayals, interpersonal tensions, and widespread deception. The murderous wheeler is an occasional interjection of lackluster pyrotechnics into what is otherwise a military drama. While that might sound kind of intriguing to some, the characters and dialogue are pretty severely lacking, and the acting ranges from “soap opera adequate” to “community theater unqualified.”
The motorcycle itself is disappointing as well. It isn’t even a motorcycle as much as it is a dirt bike with a bunch of vaguely menacing accoutrements glued onto it. To say the least, it didn’t match the image of a bladed, chrome, roaring Harley Davidson beast with a taste for blood that was initially conjured in my head from the title.
The MurdercycleGoogle Image result for “evil motorcycle”Google Image result for “killer motorcycle”
An unexpected amount of time in the move is dedicated to vaguely interesting philosophical issues, like the ethics of Artificial Intelligence and the potential boundary-violating practice of mind reading. Weirdly, though, the ability to read people’s thoughts is taken as a given,and is apparently public knowledge in the world of the movie: one of the central characters is a psychic, and no one is terribly surprised, alarmed, or even incredulous about that claim.
The real problem with the injecting of these philosophical ideas into the story isn’t that they are there (science fiction really should intersect with philosophy), but how they are written in. Every time one of these thought-provoking issues comes up, the movie grinds to a complete halt, and they are addressed with the subtlety of a hammer on a gong. Even worse, they are addressed really poorly, like you are sitting in on the first session of a Philosophy 101 course.
Likewise, the writers clearly wanted to slip in references to comic books in the screenplay, which is something that can be done well and effectively without distracting the audience. However, instead of making the references organic and natural, the characters are written to go out of their way to mention specifics about the Fantastic Four over and over again, beyond the point of saturation.
Honestly, this is one of the most disappointing movies I have seen in a long time. Not only is the title golden, but there were plenty of ways to make the movie better, even with the existing plot. I actually appreciate some of the ideas presented here, which indicate some ambition in the writing, but the execution was disappointingly sloppy. The end result of it all is a movie that is basically Predator, but with freshman philosophy discussions instead of over-the-top machismo, and an amateurishly-decorated dirtbike instead of a terrifying alien.
Reviews/Trivia of B-Movies, Bad Movies, and Cult Movies.
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While A Separate Reality doesn’t have any movies among its considerable inventory, this is the kind of record store I always hope to find. The selection of vintage soundtracks was as massive as it was eccentric, featuring everything from science-fiction classics to italian horror flicks to blaxploitation legends to children’s films. The selection included so many notables that I’m only going to spotlight only a handful of them here, and recommend that people check this place out on their own.
Hercules is a 1983 movie directed by Luigi Cozzi for Cannon films, and stars Lou Ferrigno as the legendary demi-god. Even if you haven’t seen this movie, you may have been exposed to the infamous clip of Ferrigno throwing a bear into outer space. I did a full write-up on this bizarre movie a while back, and I highly recommend it.
Misan[trope]y 