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Author: Parca Mortem
[Hey, you! The
section is still under construction. The layers have only been set
a fraction of an eon ago]
H through N
Holy Mountain
(1975)
Directed, Starring, and Written by: Alejandro Jodorowsky (El
Topo)
Genre: Good question.
Duration: 1 hour 54 minutes.
Availability: Some versions on laserdisc are available, but
otherwise look for copies of Japanese editions in cult video rentals.
Now this is 70s weirdness. In other words, expect this to be an acid trip filled with political messages, social criticisms, religious debasement, and incomplete philosophical and pseudo-philosophical messages, not to mention a touch of New Age sponsoring. To top it off, this is made by the chilean nut himself, Jodorowsky. The story (or whatever you want to call it) unfolds itself like this. First we get to see a guy who looks like Jesuschrist, who happens to be a beggar, whom joins a limp guy and wanders into a city, where while witnessing the local attraction (a battle of frogs dressed like roman soldiers) he is misstreated, used to make statues, gets it on with prostitutes, gets drugged, among other wild sacrilegious images. The next morning he wakes up and eventually he sees this tall tower standing in the middle of the city that everyone is standing around, and jumps onto the hook of some sort of construction machine and hikes to the top. In the top of the tower he finds the quarters of "The Alchemist", a wizard/wiseman/guru-like character played by Jodorowsky himself. The Alchemist battles the Jesus-like guy, and then proceeds him some wonders and some horrors, after which he starts training him in the wise ways, while telling him things like "you are excrement". Then the Alchemist starts talking about 6 individuals that rule the world in evil manners, all that are connected to the worlds of business, government, and military, each of which is from a planet of the Solar System. He shows us the horrible deeds that these individuals carry out, as Jodorowsky throws every single attack on the government, business, and military circles as is possible, in a quite ingenous satirical way. Among the images shown are an artist who literally makes his work on an assembly line, an army shooting up people celebrating peace, children being trained to hate those of another country (here Jodorowsky makes it a more direct attack on his own government, as he picks Peru as the country to be hated), a businessman who makes decisions by feeling how moist his wife's vagina is, among even more wicked imagery.
As if the above were not enough, then the Alchemist recruits these 6 characters, and, together with his assistant and the Jesus-like character, he anounces that he wants to take the entire group on an expedition to the Holy Mountain, at the summit of which are the nine rulers of wisdom, all of which he wants to replace with the 9 members of his group, so that they can all achieve the ultimate wisdom. Of course, the before the trip, they must all "cleanse" themselves, which involves shaving off their heads and renouncing to everything material, while training (where else in the 70s?) in the Andes, among other things. Then we get the actual journey, which is just as bizarre as everything else, and where the Alchemist takes as many pot shots at "Jesus" as possible. They finally arrive to the island where the Mountain is, which includes a town built at its base that has all the people that tried and failed. The best representation of these characters is this crazy guy who can move through anything in any direction... but only horizontally. And so to not seem like a hippy, Jodorowsky also takes some attacks on Tim Leary & Co. So... will our heroes make it to the summit, and will we get to see the greatest revelation of all (whatever it is)? I'm not telling, but I do warn you to expect an ending similar to that of Monty Python and the Holy Grial. Let's just say that when the meaning of life is to be revealed, he pulls off one of the strangest endings ever, sort of a "why should you care about what a film says?" ending.
As much of a pain as this film can be to sit through at times, it is always fascinating. It is loaded with symbolism at every frame, but at least it is clever symbolism, 70% of which you can understand what is being criticized. Jodorowsky is clearly insane as he constructs a modern fable with nightmarish images, and all of his criticisms are valid nowadays. Of course, you can take shots back at many of the messages that he gives out, as well as attack the rather implied new age superiority. But that's the interesting part; it's like a good philosophical debate, and it leaves you with something to think over and discuss. Probably the best summary of the film comes from the first shot of the film, which is of Jodorowski shaving off the hair of two women and leaving them naked. Jodorowsky basically aims to strip us of all that has been used up till now (or should I say 1975) to define the ultimate philosophy of life and the path to happiness, without really giving us anything new to build on, assigning the task to ourselves. That shot also summarizes the film in the sense that it is completely bizarre. Let's just say that it gets compared to Eraserhead quite often... It is DEFINITELY one of the most bizarre films of all time.
Bizareness: 10 shots out of 10.
Rating: 8 out of 10
Hamlet (2000)[yes,
I realize that this movie should be listed alphabetically before Holy Mountain,
but Holy Mountain is cooler]
Directed and Adapted by: Michael Almereyda (Nadja, The
Eternal, Twister -1988)
Starring: Ethan Hawke, Kyle MacLachlan (Dune, Blue
Velvet, Showgirls), Julia Stiles (10 Things I Hate About
You, Save the Last Dance, State and Main), Diane Venora
(The Insider, True Crime, Heat, F/X, Romeo+Juliet),
Bill Murray, Liev Schreiber (Scream trilogy, RKO 281, The
Hurricane, Sphere), Karl Geary (Nadja), Sam Shepard (Steel
Magnolias, Baby Boom, The Right Stuff, Paris,Texas),
Steve Zahn (Happy,Texas, Jeepers Creepers,
Crimson Tide,
Reality
Bites, Out of Sight, You've Got Mail, That Thing You
Do!), Dechen Thurman (Uma's younger bro), Casey Affleck (Ben's younger
bro, of 200 Cigarettes, Drowning Mona, To Die For),
Jeffrey Wright (Basquiat), among others.
Based on Play Written by: Well, it sure wasn't Franklin W. Dixon!
There's one unspoken rule of modern theatre that has leaked into movies
- more specifically, movies based on plays. And that
is that if you are doing a play that has been done half a zillion times,
the director is obligated to screw around with the scenery,
the set design, the camera - heck, the entire visuals and perhaps even
the performances, in order to give a new interpretation of
the play. Sometimes this can be interesting, other times it can
be crap. When doing films about Shakespeare plays, what
directors do is screw around with the time period (for the extreme,
watch Titus).
So, here we have Hamlet, a play that has been translated to film over
50 times (half of them during the silent era alone!), not to
mention another near 20 times on TV. But, this one is actually
different - again. This one actually speaks in a British accent!
Oh, wait, scratch that, that was Robin Hood: Men in Tights.
No, the differences here are that 1) it is set entirely in modern
New York, among snobs and within a multi-billionaire corporation, 2)
at last one guy under the age of 30 plays Hamlet, and 3)
the movie is less than 2 hours long (take that, Brannagh).
Michael Almereyda claimed that he wanted to do more of a visual
collage to reinterpret the play. Actually, this is a good idea.
You see, the whole fun, actually, is not watching a story that you
have seen or read at least once (hopefully) and know how it is going
to turn out. The fun and the suspense fall on wondering
how the heck is director Almereyda going to reinterpret or adapt the
next scene.
So what DO we get? Hamlet (Ethan Hawke) and Ophelia (Julia Stiles)
are stereotypical Gen-Xers as portrayed on Mtv and
TV commercials. Furthermore, Hamlet is a film student - one of
those stereotypical film students that obsessively record
everything with their cameras like Wes Bently in American Beauty
(when we all know that the people who most obsessively
record everything are those annoying uncles of yours). His father
is the CEO and, uhm, "king" of the Denmark Co. Claudius (a
surpringly good Kyle MacLachlan) makes his announcement of his takeover
by holding a press conference. Claudius and Gertrude (Diane Venora)
are ultra-rich socialites. Rosencrantz (Steve Zahn) and Guildenstern
(Dechen Thurman) are fratboy-like clubbers who dress up like metalheads.
Ophelia is also a photographer. Her father, Polonius (Bill Murray) is a
kind and loving but overprotective father who happens to speak just like
Bill Murray does in every day (Murray does bring in the freshest version
of that character that I have ever seen), only that in Shakesperian language.
Horatio (Geary) has a motorcycle. Instead of blades, guns are used.
Instead of making a play, Hamlet makes a movie. Hamlet spends some
of his time meditating while wandering through the aisles of Blockbuster.
Faxes, cell phones, recording bugs, computers, and answering machines are
used to relay messages. Limos substitute confessionary booths.
And so on. I don't want to mention ALL of the changes and adaptations,
because that would pretty much spoil the movie for you. But you get
the idea.
As for the actors, most seem to adapt the Shakespeare lines into their
own way of speaking, which turns out quite fine. A few
do remain in the classic mode of performing Shakespeare, or sway from
one method to the other. MacLachlan is surprising,
once again, turning in a darker and more sinister performance than
I'm accostomed to see him do, and he does it well. And
Murray's performance is quite entertaining. But the ones who turn in
the best performances are Verona (who already was part
of Kevin Kline's TV version of the play ten years ago) and particularly
Liev Schreiber, as Laertes. The rest of the cast fares
well, with a few exceptions. Sam Shepard gives us a less creepy
and more concerned ghost, with a fine performance, but
never seems to be the father of Hamlet. Julia Stiles doesn't
do all that much with Ophelia, but, then again, Almereyda doesn't
let her do that much. The oddest performance, though, is from
Ethan Hawke. He does a good job at half of the moments, but
the other half he sucks all the energy out of his character and makes
him too weak, while he starts to nearly mumble in a almost
monotone voice. Quite frankly, I didn't really care that much
what happened to his Hamlet. I don't know if this was an
intentional move by Almereyda, though.
One complaint about the adaptation is that the graveyard scene was trimmed
down to nothing (although, to be fair, most film
versions omit or trim this scene, not to mention several stage versions
I've seen), and Hamlet's famous "to be or not to be" is
said only during suicidal videotapings early on. However, one
very odd related touch is that at one moment Hamlet is actually
watching one of the older movie versions of Hamlet, the scene where
that Hamlet is clutching a skull. Don't ask... Another
similar odd thing is that Hamlet watches trailers for True Crime,
which has Diane Venora in the cast.
A question: Hey, why does every recent updated version of Shakespeare
have to have Julia Stiles in the cast? She was in 10
Things I Hate About You, which was an adaptation of The Taming
of the Shrew, and she's in the soon to be released O,
which is an updated version of Othello. Typecasting, anyone?
Of course, if you are an extreme Shakespeare purist, the type that believes
that his plays should only be done the traditional
way (and starring Lawrence Olivier too, if possible), then you should
stay away from this film. If you don't mind adaptations as
long as the dialogue is intact, then you may enjoy it.
Bizarreness level: 4 shots out of 10
Rating: 7 out of 10
Hercules in New York (a.k.a. Hercules
Goes Bananas, Hercules: The Movie)
(1970)
Directed by: Arthur Allan Seidelman (a TV director)
Starring: Arnold Strong, Arnold Stang (the voice of many characters
from Herman the mouse to Jughead on the radio version of Archie,
to a voice in Pinnocchio in Outer Space; and of course he was featured
in It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World with every other annoying comedian
of the time), James Karen (Return of the Living Dead, Joyride,
the Tobe Hooper remake of Invaders from Mars, the remake of Piranha,
The
Unborn, Hardbodies 2, Frankenstein Meets the Space Monster
- a.k.a. Mars Attacks Puerto Rico, Revenge of the Nerds IV: Nerds
in Love, and, oh, Thirteen Days, Any Given Sunday, The
Jazz Singer, Wall Street, and Apt Pupil - talk about
a wildly mixed career!), Deborah Loomis (Dark Shadows,
Blood
Bath), Ernest Graves (The Dogs of War), Tanny McDonald (Series
7: The Contenders), Taina Elg (1957 Golden Globe winner for best newcomer
for Gaby, who popped up in the 1959 The 39 Steps, Watusi
and
The
Mirror Has Two Faces), among others.
Written and Produced by: Ausbrey Winsberg (Son of Sinbad,
Devil
Men From Space, Sword of Venus, The Man from Planet X,
Captive
Women, The Neanderthal Man, Return to Treasure Island,
Captain
Kidd and the Slave Girl).
One of the delights of the writers of websites such as these is locating and talking about the first movies of well respected actors. So you will find several mentions of He Knows You're Alone, the lame slasher that has Tom Hanks' 3-minute debut on screen, or Amityville 3-D, with a young Meg Ryan, or Dana Carvey's 3 seconds on screen at the end of Halloween II, Angelina Jolie in Cyborg 2, Ed Harris' brief appearance in Creepshow, Billy Bob Thornton in Troma's Chopper Chicks from Zombietown, Robert DeNiro's early work with Brian De Palma, Jack Nicholson's early work with Roger Corman and The Monkees, George Clooney in Return of the Killer Tomatoes, Brad Pitt in Cutting Class, Billy Zane in Critters, Leonardo Di Caprio in Critters 3 (hey, there is a connection between Titanic and the Critters movies somewhere!), Angela Basset in Critters 4, etc. But then there's a greater delight: writing about B-movies with stars with little or no talent that we're all pretty much sick of. The movies reviewed go from something rather tame as Melanie Griffith's first starring role in Cherry 2000, to John Travolta's brief appearance in The Devil's Rain (also a Shatner, Borgnine, and Tom Skerritt flick), to Sylvester Stallone's porno The Party at Kitty and Stud's (a.k.a. The Itallian Stallion). Near the bottom of the stack is THIS movie: the first starring role of... ARNOLD STRONG!
So... who the heck is Arnold Strong?
Easy answer, my friend: he's the then future Mr. Universe, Ahrnold Szhcharzzzzzennneggheheheerrrr (correctly written as Arnold Schwarzenegger). Why the different name? It's Hollywood, silly! You don't stand around with a name that nobody can remember, much pronounce or write down! Why do you think Issur Danielovitch changed his name to Kirk Douglas, Edda Van Heemstra Hepburn-Ruston became Audrey Hepburn, Kong-sang Chan became Jackie Chan, Lawrence Tureaud became Mr. T, and William Henry Pratt became Boris Karloff! Uh, wait, never mind the last one... Anyway, if you're going to change a name no American can pronounce, how about changing the voice of an actor who cannot pronounce a single word in English? And this is what they did in this movie. Unfortunately, whomever dubbed ol' Ahnold wasn't that good a speaker himself. Not to mention that a lot of his dialogue sounds like if it was written by George W. Bush.
Anyway, ol' Ahnol takes the sandals of the late Steve Reeves, Reg Park, Samson Burke, Mark Forest, Nigel Green, Mickey Hargitay, Mike Lane, Kirk Morris, Dan Vadis, Gordon Scott, Brian Thompson, Åke Söderblom, and which his eternal rival Lou Ferrigno would take a decade later, before Sam Raimi gave them to Kevin Sorbo. Ah, but did any of them go to New York? No! Did any of them wrestle a bear? No! Did any of them have comic relief from the reliably annoying Arnold Stang? Fortunately, no! Ah, but this one does! However, do not despair! Like most of the aforementioned, this one has VERY BAD DUBBING!
This movie is hilariously inept from beginning to end. It starts with Hercules in Olympus (wait a minute, didn't Hercules live on Earth, and only full gods - not demigods - were allowed in Heaven?), telling his cotton-bearded father Zeus that he's bored, and needs new adventure. Hercules is kind of a jerk, and Zeus looks like he's going to have a heart attack in any moment (so much for inmortality), so, after denying his request, something odd happens with a lightning bolt and he sends him to New York (good to know the greek gods are up to date, eh?). Never mind the fact that Olympus looks like NY's Central Park (where it was probably filmed - hey, isn't that a frisbee player in the background, and aren't those the sounds of traffic?) nor that the greek gods all speak English. Nope, Hercules still has to fly to New York. Say, I wonder when they discontinued those flights that were straight from Heaven to New York City? I mean, where can I get a ticket? I'm sure the Olympus is quite a good vacationing spot! Maybe it was a PanAm flight... [Note: most current versions no longer carry this scene in the plane]
Of course, Hercules is such an arrogant jerk that he gets thrown off the plane. So, naturally, the next scene he's on a boat. How he got there is anyone's guess. As Hercules is already arriving to the Big Rotten Apple, suddenly the ship captain informs him that he has to work, because its part of the condition that he were taken to NYC. How he had money to fly from Olympus to NY but not to take a boat midway is anyone's guess. Oh, wait! "Hercules has no need for money", he says at one point. Now, if one were in Hercules' situation, one would wonder why they were never forced to work on all the trip until now that there were only about 30 minutes left. Hercules, however, just says that the son of Zeus will never work, or something like that, and beats up the entire crew, and dives off the ship. When he arrives to the harbor, he encounters an uncredited JOHN CANDY! Yes, THE John Candy, in his official film debut. All that he does is look scared, though.
It is somewhere around then that he encounters Pretzie (yes, there's someone in this film actually called 'Pretzie'), played by Arnold Stang. Now, there's a reason why Stang has only appeared in front of the camera in 1/8 of his 60+ movie and TV career: he's an ugly little skinny guy who's even more annoying with his physical attempts at comedy. I hated him from the first frame to the last frame where he showed up. Heck, just take a look at the last two movies he's been in: Ghost Dad and Dennis the Menace. If you ever want lessons in overacting, have no doubt: Arnold Stang will be your best teacher (outside of the soap opera and porno worlds, of course). And how much do you want to bet that somebody hired Stang just so you could have the 'hilarious' star credits that read "starring Arnold Strong and Arnold Stang!" Haha! Get it? Strong and Stang!... Nope, I don't get it either.
Once in NYC, Hercules doesn't want to be so much a hero as he wants to be a star. So he does all sorts of ridiculous acts, most of which include posing for different stores, belittling a decathlon team that he tries to coach, wrestling pro wrestlers and a bear, getting into trouble with mobsters, etc. I won't enter into a full description to allow you to enjoy the surprises. Somewhere along the line, the bimbo daughter of a college professor encounters Hercules, they fall in love, and she tries to tame him. And then Zeus gets fed up with Hercules and sends Nemesis to defeat him. This doesn't make a whole lot of sense, as Zeus had previously sent Atlas (hmmm... who will hold Earth meanwhile?) and Samson (yes, a biblical character) to help him. Oh wait, it was really Juno that sent Nemesis, or something like that. Don't expect the fights to be better than those in any Rudy Ray Moore flick, though. Nemesis just gives Hercules a poison that takes away his strength, and then he has to fight wrestlers and mobsters in a "normal", "hilarious" manner, which should better be described as horribly choreographed and directed.
As far as Hercules' dialogue goes, you wonder why they didn't go ahead with Arnie speaking the lines. I mean, they're all self-centered baby talk: Hercules this, Hercules that. It just gets hilarious when you hear a badly dubbed deep voice saying: "HA, HA, HA! YOU STRUCK HERCULES!" Unfortunately, we do not get "Hercules will be back!".
Not only is this ineptly written and acted, but is is ineptly shot as well. The cinematographer never shot before and his only related work afterwards was as the camera operator in The Gambler. The editor's only other film credit is in a documentary about Paul Robeson. The composer never scored another flick (thankfully for the sake of our ears). The assistant director became the assitant director a couple of years later in Fred Williamson's blaxploitation western The Legend of N*gger Charlie. Only the make-up artist went onto anything worthwhile, working on Serpico and Dog Day Afternoon. And it is no wonder, as this could have been done (perhaps even better) by a bunch of junior high school students.
Is this worth a view? Of course! But only if severely drunk. I mean SEVERELY drunk. You see, someone may have intended this to be a parody of the Hercules movies, at best, but even failed at that! It's all G-rated as well. So you really have to laugh AT the film, not with it. And at times even that can be hard, unless you have a non-stop love or hatred of Arnold "Strong". But this is a must if you are having a drunken MST3K tribute party. Otherwise... well, it's as good as a movie called Hercules Goes Bananas (not to be confused with Herbie Goes Bananas) starring Arnold Schwarzenneger.
Bizarreness level: 7 shots out of 10
Rating: 1 out of 10
Directed by: Brian De Palma
Starring: Robert De Niro
The "sequel" to Greetings, once again starring Robert DeNiro and his voyeur character. This movie is somewhat less fun, but more famous due to its great pseudo-documentary "Be Black Baby", in which white characters are discriminated against. The whole movie makes very little sense, but it spoofs the late 60s and early 70s, and at the end appears to be showing how a young adult starts leaving ideals and conforms in order to become a middle-aged adult. A cult film, by any means.
Bizarreness level: 8 shots out of 10
Rating: 5 out of 10.
The Human Tornado
(1976)
Directed by: Cliff Roquemore (Petey Wheatstraw, the Devil's
Son-In-Law)
Starring: Rudy Ray Moore (Dolemite, Disco Godfather,
Petey
Wheatstraw, the Devil's Son-In-Law)
Written by: Jerry Jones (Dolemite)
Rudy Ray Moore is back as Dolemite, and worse than ever! You know the movie is going to be laughably bad (and mostly intentionally so) when the first scene features Rudy stripping in the highway, to show off his tubby self. In the first few minutes of the film he's screwing a white woman who gets shot by her redneck husband (who is the local sheriff), and soon the cops are after Dolemite. Meanwhile, the REAL plot settles in as Dolemite's friends are being harrassed at their nightclub by mobsters, and two girls get kidnapped. It's hard to remember what else follows, because you HAVE to watch this under the influence of alcohol, or something similar. Particularly every time Dolemite gets laid (the more entertaining one being with Queen Bee and her large afro, in which there's a poster in the wall behind the bed with a drawing of her naked). And QUITE particularly when Dolemite fights. Rudy is an awful fighter, but likes to pretend he knows karate, so he throws a bunch of punches and kicks that wouldn't hurt a fly, and which for the most part don't even make contact by a long shot, but they happen in FAST-MOTION! This includes his super jumps as well. Of course, you get a lot of Rudy's choice dialogue, AND his army of karate strippers. And if you haven't lost it by the time that Dolemite is rescuing the girl who is standing on a granade, you will then. Be on the look-out for a young Ernie Hudson making his film debut, delivering a wise-crack back to Dolemite.
I just have to add one word to convince you to watch this film: DISCO!
Bizarreness level: 7 shots out of 10.
Rating: 1 or 7 out of 10 (depending on whether you take it seriously
or if you decide to enjoy it)
I Stand Alone (Seul
Contre Tous)
(1998)
Directed, Written, Produced, and Edited by: Gaspar Noé
Starring: Phillipe Nahon (La Haine)
Genre: Drama/Suspense
Duration: 1 hr. 33 mins.
Availability: It is still making a run through film festivals,
and is available on DVD.
European cinema is characterized by either making tales that are too slow, sweet, dreamy, and simple, or by attempting to shock the audience. Perhaps the british and irish are different, as they tend to make tales that either want to exhude class, or that at least are well scripted mostly coherent (despite occasionally bizarre), and not as pretentious. The spanish and those of the nordic countries may also fit that category at times. But even films like The Full Monty and Secrets and Lies attempt to add some shock value, and the revered Almodovar and Neil Jordan are all about trying to win the awe of the audience by adding satirical moments that are meant to make you shake your head in disbelief. So tell me, the cinema from which continent is the one that features more: scenes in a bathroom, hard core sex, sexual taboo issues (rape, necrophilia, pedophilia, incest, homosexuality), sex in general, ugly people (heck, while the US casts more beautiful people than actually are anywhere in real life, Europeans cast more ugly people than what is usual to find anywhere), higher content of non-comical combinations of swear words (and their repetition), gore, extended torture scenes (and extended footage of the people being tortured), extended death scenes, scenes that should have been in a bathroom, ugly settings, and anything that you don't want to watch without a barf bag? What is Europe?Your answer is correct! Bonus question: which continent even puts a special emphasis on all of the above, to make sure that you don't miss it, even it if it's irrelevant? Europe? Yes! You win a trip to the worst toilet in Scotland, hosted by a bunch of ugly people! Nooooooooo! Take it back, take it baaaack! Auntie 'em, Auntie 'em!...
Anyway, what you do have to give the Europeans credit is that, despite that they make what are simply exploitation flicks, they are stylish. That is why critics and art students slobber over them, and give many directors more than what they deserve. So this pushes many European directors to make bizarre, incoherent, pretentious, stylish exploitation films. Heck, even the Cannes Film Festival emphasizes this, as an overwhelming number of films they select and award are those that are like this type of European film, regardless of their origin... But I should not ramble so much, because, for me, execution is what is most valuable in a film, and I'm a sucker for style. So, I wind up watching these "artistic" films. The slight problem is that while some are brilliant, an enormous amount are empty, exploitative pretentious trash. And waaaay too many are alleged character studies, a great amount of which resemble Taxi Driver, only not as good. They hammer their metaphors and style into your head until it hurts, while placing in front of you an endurance contest, to see how much shock you can tolerate. Some of the shock will send you into laughter, other will touch you or wrench your heart, and the rest will simply disgust you and make you feel uncomfortable.
Which brings us to this film, a spin off from the French short film Carne. This is basically what would have happened is a French pretentious exploitative "artiste" did Taxi Driver. The background of the character to be studied is explained by himself at the beginning of the film, through a series of pictures placed on screen as if slides, while he narrates in news anchor style. He is an orphan, born to a mother he never knew, and fathered by a French communist killed by the Nazis in WWII, which he never met either. After a rough childhood (that included being raped at an early age by a priest), he somehow pulled himself together and wound up being a successfull butcher in Paris. However, things got difficult when he deflowered one of his workers, whom had a child which she dumped onto him, after abandoning them, and dying (further details given later on). He raised his daughter as best as he could, but one day he made a mistake and thought that his daughter had been raped, so he attempted to slice up one of his workers which he thought was guilty. That landed him in jail for a brief time, while he lost the custody of his daughter and lost his business as well. This led to his misery and ruin, and, now when the story picks up, he's trying to start a new life, with a woman he hates that is pregnant with his unrequested child, who has a little bit more of money. This makes him leave his beloved ugly Paris and go to the north of the country, to live with her mother. In the north he can find a job, but not any that brings him satisfaction: he hates 'em all.
So the film shows how he starts accumulating more tension, more feelings of alienation, and, eventually, more hate. His hate for his misstress grows when she refuses to setup the butcher shop for him that she had promised. He eventually snaps one night when his ugly bitchy mistress picks on some gossip and accuses him of infidelity (when he had actually spent the evening at a hard core porn theatre, the only place where he can find pleasure, while he feeds his ideal to become a porn filmmaker - none of the details of the penetration in the hard core flick are spared, by the way). So he winds up beating her up, causing a probable forced abortion, and stealing a gun from his mother-in-law. This makes him flee back to Paris, nearly penniless, yet armed with a gun and absolute, pure, extreme hate. The fact that Paris is economically depressed doesn't help, nor the fact that he's prejudiced against homosexuals, the rich, the nazis, the germans, and immigrant arabs. Furthermore, feelings of alienation have completely won him over (as if you couldn't tell from the title), so he feels that his kind old economically depressed friends are backstabbing him when they cannot lend him any money nor give him a job (despite their offering other forms of help), and feels that the helpful (yet rumored homosexual) manager of a slaughterhouse he applies to work for is discriminating against him for having been in jail. His having to mix with the bottom of the Parisian barrell does not help either. So he completely breaks down and decides to go on a killing spree to kill those that he has come to hate at extreme levels. But before he does that, he decides to visit his young daughter, the only person he loves, for one last time. Entering into further details would spoil the suspense.
Director Noé achieves to transmit the feelings of alienation and hate in many ways, first by an effective technique of making a loud "BANG!" sound every other minute, during which the screen blacks out for a split second and a close up of somesort is shown. Another is by having Nahon narrating non-stop the thoughts of the butcher (who either went nameless or whose name was hardly ever mentioned), all of them in a very angry voice. And then there's the great performance of Nahon himself... But some odder elements are introduced, such as messages being placed on the screen with random phrases such as "Living is a selfish act", or that serve the purpose of dividing into chapters at uneven times. The oddest one of these black screens is one that indicates the audience, near the end of the film, that they have 30 seconds (counting down) to leave the movie. This happens of course at the most tense of parts, just before the climax of the story, suggesting a very bloody and sick finale. Actually, it does involve the bloodiest and sickest part of the flick (to the surprise of whomever is watching the film after reading this, and remembering these words, somehow), but IT IS NOT WHAT YOU EXPECT. It is rather a let down, and a couple of scenes that make you sick, not entertained nor absorbed (this coming from a guy who rutinely watches Lucio Fulci flicks). Once again, I unfortunately cannot describe it without spoiling it.
However, Noé overdid many things in order to shock people. The beating/abortion scene is overfocused and more than what one can handle. One person is killed and dies slowly, while being tortured and bleeding in ridiculous yet graphic levels common more in Fulci flicks and the latter Mario Bava ones, not to mention the ones produced (but not directed) by Dario Argento. The difference is that here you feel sorry for the person. There's also incest (more suggested than shown, yet very strongly suggested), which really doesn't have anything to do with anything except to show the confusion inside certain character's head and the character's quest for love (at the end the film does ask what is wrong with this incest anyway, that it is merely a societal constraint, but it doesn't work out as well as in many other films and just comes off as sick). I do not question other exploitative elements because they were necessary for this portrayal and fit in well. But the above mentioned and some others were just beyond any purpose (not even that of the film) other than an endurance marathon. Most people are not going to be able to sit through this one, trust me (although some John Waters fans and all Jorg Buttgereit fans will easily)...
I can't emit a complete verdict on this, as I am still balancing out the good parts of the film and the rest that is brought down by the overly sick parts. It is a good film that lets you go inside the head of an interesting character that is brilliantly portrayed, but it stops being enjoyable rather quickly, and it leaves a dirty feeling at the end. And it's not one of those dirty feelings you can awake compassion in you like in Schindler's List or Cannibal Holocaust...
Bizarreness level: 7 shots out of 10
Rating: 6 or 7 out of 10.
Inferno
(1980)
Directed and Written by: Dario Argento (Suspiria, Trauma,
Phenomena,
Deep
Red, Tenebrae)
Starring: Leigh McClosky, Irene Miracle, Veronica Lazar,
Alida Valli, and Eleonora Georgi, among others.
Genre: Horror
Duration: 1 hour 47 mins.
Availability: It has resurfaced in several video stores among
other classic Argento films recently. Otherwise, look for it in mostly
cult video rentals. The Sci-Fi channel and the IFC have also been
showing it since Halloween 2000.
This is italian horror maestro Argento at his creepiest and most atmospheric. It is also his film that makes the least sense whatsoever. My theory is that Argento just regurgitated as many images and ideas that he had left out of his previous work and decided to loosely compound them into one film. People and critics alike have often compared it to other italian horror maestro Lucio Fulci’s The Beyond, for this. Actually, it does have things in common with The Beyond, but in the sense that several characters die for no reason at all (not even for plot reasons), the horror is connected to a building and otherworldly entities, and that one male character in one scene encounters the blueprints for the building, after which he is killed and the prints disappear from the book where he found them in. But that’s about as much as it has in common with Fulci’s legendary (and superior) gore maximus zombiefest (which I highly recommend, by the way). This has more in common with Argento’s own Suspiria, only that at least that film made some sense. In fact, it is supposedly the sequel to that film.
The story (?) roughly goes on like this: a student in New York becomes fascinated with a book written by an architect and alleged alchemist that tells about the existence of “The Three Mothers”, three spirits that are trapped in buildings in Rome, New York City, and in Germany, the latter which was apparently the head witch in Suspiria. She just happens to live in one of the buildings, and she proceeds to write a letter about them to her brother Mark, who just happens to be a music student in Rome, and warns about some keys that unlock the spirits. Shortly after, she’s offed by the typical faceless killer that wears a black leather glove that is featured in most Argento films. Meanwhile, the letter is somehow intercepted by the Mother in Rome, yet Mark eventually gets hold of it and goes to New York. This is not, however, before his female friend gets to read the letter first and gets subsequently splattered, along with someone else. Along the way in his investigation Mark meets with several characters who try to help him or who have information but send him away, all of who get killed. The action moves on from character to character who gains the information and then has to face some form of gory death, all of which leads up to with the remaining character facing off the witch in New York, who was really a strange unfriendly character all along, and whom sets the building on fire while she transforms herself into a cheesy costume that is supposed to be a representation of the Grim Reaper. And that’s all, folks!
Of course, what matters in this film is the stylish direction of all the death sequences. This is a very suspenseful film, not to mention atmospheric. Just like there was blue light throughout all of Suspiria, here nearly every shot is dominated by an intense red light, or blue light, or green light, all blended in with the darkness. As well, there is goblinesque music all throughout, as would be expected (but the Goblins don't perform; rather, it's music by Keith Emmerson). The death scenes are very long and intense, not to mention and gory and senseless. For example, one character winds up slipping into a sort of creek where he is subsequently attacked by hundreds of rats that chew on him in the same manner that animals always attack people in Argento and Fulci films, while the character screams for help, getting what appears to be a rescue by some streetvendor, only to get his throat slashed inexplicably by this non-savior. The standout scene of the whole film is one sequence where the first character is in a basement and one of the keys falls into a hole in the floor that is an entrance to a flooded room, and she of course decides to go diving in after them, only to encounter some surprises underwater. This incredibly suspenseful and horrific sequence was, by the way, conceived and cinematographed by veteran horror “master” Mario Bava, in what was his last contribution to cinema (and in my opinion, the only good one).
Despite this great atmosphere, the lack of any sort of real plot, the lack of cohesion, and the lack of any sense at all will drive you nuts eventually, because this always fools you into believing that it has a plot. So be prepared to have something to alleviate a possible headache (I suggest a heavy amount of alcohol). But otherwise turn off the lights and enjoy this creepy flick.
Bizarreness level: 7 shots out of 10.
Rating: 7 out of 10.
The Item
(1999)
Directed, written by, and starring: Dan Clark (a former writer
of Ninja Turtles: The Next Mutation, and the creator of Brats
of the Lost Nebula)
Also starring: a bunch of other unknowns who've done nothing
else except appear in other flicks of the director.
Whomever is responsible for this movie should be dragged by wild horses. First off, there is no plot, just an unfinished plot outline. The cover of the box is really deceptive advertising - the "item" is not a lizard-like monster with a wicked eye, but actually a large phallic worm with the eyes and mouth of Pac-Man. Then there's the use of a videocamera, which at times almost looks like regular cinema, but usually just gives the movie the not-so-great, cheap look of Redneck Zombies. And more importantly, pretty much all the characters are annoying, particularly the lead character, one of those geeks who believes that by being a jerk he's cool (you know, the type of person everyone would love to beat up). The movie is filled with attempts of cheesy humor (e.g. a badly dressed mega-geek scientist, transvestites appearing at the wrong moment, comic-book like action), which all fall flat because they are waaaaaaaaay too STUPID. In the end, the "item" hardly interacts with the storyline, and the movie is pretty much a Tarantino-wannabe shoot-out, filled with fake blood and people shooting forever. And for all the action, it moves slooooooowly. Did I say the "monster" was phallic? That's an understatement. It's just a giant dildo, with a tail that is a smaller dildo. Its actualy talking to the characters only happens for about 5 minutes of the total screen time, in which it just feeds back to them their inner thoughts, preparing them for running into another pointless shoot-out. It has no symbolism, no hidden meaning, no art to it. It is a black comedy, but once again, it is too idiotic. To top it off, to pretend to be art, a senseless "ending" is added, which of course is not an ending at all.
The "plot"? Four alleged hitmen (only one of which may be believable) are hired by an anonymous entity to take pick up a box in the middle of the desert from a scientist, and then keep it safe for less than a day. In total, each would receive $1 million. Things get out of whack from the beginning as everyone gets nervous and the scientists wind up shot dead. Then they go to the apartment of the art student girlfriend of the annoying leader of the pack, to wait it out. Curiosity quickly gets ahold of them, and they open the mechanized crate. They find a phallic-like creature asleep. They mess around with it and then lock it up again. A while later, an alarm goes off in the crate and the creature is revived. At first they are afraid of the silly looking giant smiling dildo, but then the unprofessional cons put it in a large bucket in the bathroom. The thing is quiet and immobile. Eventually it gets to talking to them one by one, pretty much repeating their troubled inner thoughts. In the end, they all kill each other. I almost forgot! Thrown in at the middle for no reason is a 30-minute sequence in which five transvestites show up at the door, resulting in that the cons get nervous (despite the fact that the crate was closed at the moment) and shoot at the transvestites. A couple survive, so they chase them into a series of never-ending alleys. One of them, an Asian, can fight and jump around like Jet Li, if Jet Li used corny trick photography. Then everyone gets guns at shoots at each other non-stop without inflicting a single wound, even at point-blank, for what seems like forever. It all is really pointless, and the director's attempts at trying to make the action sequences cool actually make them look cheap and amateurish - which is what they are!
I like black comedies. I like bizarre movies. I like some movies with comic-book-like action. I support independent film. All of this, however, as long as it is good. This was just plain trash that brings a disgrace to independent bizarre black comedies. Some movies are independent because studios don't think they are commercial enough for the average consumer zombie. Others are independent because they are just incredibly bad and boring. This is one of the latter. Oh, and it is not even original in any of what it is doing. I even tried watching it with the help of alcohol. No improvement. A couple of lines here and there can entertain, but overall, this is duller than Speed 2: Cruise Control.
I can't believe the Independent Spirit Awards (which are proven once and again to be as misguided as the Oscars) nominated this guy Dan Clark for "Someone To Watch For". It should have been for "Someone to Watch Get Tortured by a pack of Rabid Wolves if He Ever Makes More Movies as Bad as This One".
Bizarreness level: 8 shots out of 10
Rating: 2 out of 10 (being KIND).
Kentucky Fried Movie
Directed by: John Landis (American Werewolf in London,
Three
Amigos,
Animal House)
One of those 70s parodies of TV (Tunnelvision and Groove Tube were the others), but this is the best one. With the immortal line: "This is Klahn's bodyguard - he is tough and ruthless. This is Klahn's chauffer - he's rough and toothless!".
Bizarreness level: 6 shots out of 10
Rating: 8 out of 10.
Jack be Nimble
Starring: Alexis Arquette
A very moody indie New Zealand horror film, by the same producer who gave us The Ugly. Can get silly at moments due to its bizarreness, but has more atmosphere than the last 10 horror movies released by Dimension films combined (except for The Others, of course).
Bizarreness level: 4 shots out of 10.
Rating: 7 out of 10.
Jacob's Ladder
Directed by: Adrian Lyne
Starring: Tim Robbins, Elizabeth Peña, Danny Aielo, Macaulay
Culkin, Eriq La Salle, Ving Rhames, among others.
A true decent into halucinatory hell, with plot twists galore. And basically, you get to pick when one of three endings you wish to keep.
[FULL REVIEW SOON]
Bizarreness level: 8 shots out of 10.
Rating: 9 out of 10
Liar of the White Worm See Ken Russell section.
Liztomania See Ken Russell section
Lost Highway See Lynch section.
M. Butterfly See Cronenberg section.
Mahler See Ken Russell Section
Man Bites Dog (original title: C'est arrivé
près de chez vous, which translates roughly to "it arrived near
where you lived")
(1992)
Directed by: Rémy Belvaux, André Bonzel, Benoît
Poelvoorde
Starring: Poelvoorde and the other two above, plus Jean-Marc
Chenut, Alain Oppezzi, Vincent Tavier, and many people in small parts.
Written by: The three directors plus Tavier
Before The Blair Witch Project, we got this odd mockumentary, where a film crew follows around a serial killer. He treats them nicely as he explains his modus operandi, and eventually they even help him in his crimes. The killer is quite charismatic - except when he's torturing people, of course, or gets into his "moods". It's sort of Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer crossed with This is Spinal Tap and the aforementioned indie horror hit, with a bit of Natural Born Killers thrown in. There are several good gags spread out, including a recurring one of the soundmen getting accidentally killed. And there's one brilliant moment when the crew runs into a TV crew following around another serial killer. Gets a bit slow at times, and it is shocking for those who aren't accustomed to violent indie European flicks - particularly a brutal rape scene. But it is overall quite worthwhile a watch. It leaves room for a sociological analysis of media's obsession with violence, reality TV, the public obsession with media, and etc, without being pretentious. But to delve into all that right now, film school paper style, would ruin the surprises of the movie. It's sick. It's twisted. It's fun. Enjoy.
Bizarreness level: 8 shots out of 10
Rating: 8 out of 10.
Meet the Feebles
(1989)
Directed by: Peter Jackson (Dead/Alive, Bad
Taste, The Frighteners, Heavenly Creatures, The
Lord of the Rings trilogy)
The original sick spoof of puppet shows.
Bizarreness level: 7 shots out of 10
Rating: 6 out of 10
Mojave Moon
Directed by: Kevin Dowling (Last Rites, some episodes
of Morning Edition and Judging Amy)
Starring: Danny Aielo, Angelina Jolie, Anne Archer, Michael
Beihn (The Terminator, Aliens), Alfred Molina (Chocolat,
Maverick,
Boogie
Nights, Magnolia, Hideaway,
Species), Zack Norman
(Romancing the Stone, Tracks,
Cadillac Man),
Peter MacNicol (Ally McBeal, Dragonslayer,
Ghostbusters
II, Sophie's Choice), among others.
Written by: Leonard Glass (Out Cold)
Yes, Angelina Jolie does appear naked in this offbeat comedy. Aside from that, it's not a bad selection to watch whenever it's playing on cable around midnight. Aielo is a good samaritan who winds up in a mess with a trailor trash mother and daughter team that fall for him, plus an insane suitor. Odd situations follow.
Bizarreness level: 5 shots out of 10
Rating: 7 out of 10
Motorama
(1992)
Directed by: Barry Shils (producer of Vampire's Kiss
and a couple of Larry Cohen flicks)
Written by: Joseph Minion (After Hours, Vampire's
Kiss)
Genre: Comedy/Fantasy
Duration: 1 hr. 30 mins.
Availability: It gets played on Cinemax and Bravo occassionally.
This is and is not a kid's film. Let's say that behind the disguise
of a Saturday morning Disney flick lookalike, director Barry Shils &
Co. made a very fucked up film filled with bizarre characters, which more
than a fantasy it is a nightmare. Sort of like a Gilliam flick without
all the great camerawork. Heck, it was made by the people behind
the fucked up Vampire's Kiss! It is a parody of different
aspects of society, doing so through several very bizarre characters.
Hey, in what kids' movie do you find:
-Parents that go broke after gambling so leave their kids in the wood.
-A kid losing his eye after being punched by a greedy slimy snob and
tortured by him and his wife.
-The same kid getting tatooed all over the place as part of a torture
session, courtesy of two bikers whom he lost a wrestling bet with, one
of them played by Meat Loaf.
-The kid saying "fuck", "shit", "ass", etc.
-Two teenagers asking the kid if they can use his car to screw, in
open presence, which they do.
-At the beginning of the film, you get to hear the parents fighting
loudly about their problems, including their choice words.
-A spoof of very religious people who care only about their afterlife.
-People dying bloody deaths in car accidents.
-Flea, from the Red Hot Chilli Peppers, furthermore playing a retarded
bus boy.
-Drew Barrymore, when she was in her Poison Ivy phase.
Hmmm... I'm having a hard time trying to think of one... This is one twisted film which you will not find on the Disney channel nor the Family channel. But then again, it is not as twisted and dark as the films listed below this one.
The plot? Okay: a kid decides to go away from his home, and builds a pair of short stilts that will enable him to reach the pedals of a car and therefore drive, after which he steals a car. On his way, after encountering several strange characters, he decides to collect all the cards of a game a company is sponsoring, wherein if you collect the cards that together spell out MOTORAMA, then you receive $100 m. Of course, these cards only contain one letter each, and furthermore, they are given out only with a $5 purchase at a gas station. So the kid goes from gas station to gas station, trying to collect all cards,while trying as well to get by (heck, he only starts out with about $30), and surviving all the obstacles placed in his way. Of course, the farther he goes, the worse the characters become...
As much as I enjoy this flick, it is beset by its rather lame ending,
where instead of resolving some problems they send it all to heck, in the
typical movie manner (come on, I'm doing my best to not spoil it).
Aside from that, I can't think of a better antithesis to an Olsen twins
"movie" (now, had this actually starred the Olsen twins instead of a recurring
guest actor from Full House, it would have been more fun watching
them get the shit kicked out of them. Then again, I wouldn't feel
sorry for them).
Bizarreness level: 7 shots out of 10.
Rating: 7 out of 10.
Directed by: Baz Luhrmann (Romeo + Juliet, Strictly
Ballroom)
Starring: Ewan MacGregor (trainspotting, The
Phantom Menace, Black Hawk Down, Shallow Grave, Velvet
Goldmine), Nicole Kidman, Jim Broadbent (Topsy-Turvy, Iris),
John Leguizamo, and Richard Foxworth.
This movie is like having a bad acid trip while watching a lame show on Broadway, which is so clichéd that to establish credibility and some level of “originality” the writers decided to incorporate lyrics of hit songs of the 60s, 70s, 80s, and early 90s. When it’s all over, you get a message that it was all about “truth, beauty, freedom, and love”, but in reality, it was all a hollow circus of nonsensical avant-garde filmmaking applied to decrepit Hollywood screenplays. So for the first half of the movie the camera is constantly speeding up, flying dizzyingly between what resemble leftover Tim Burton sets, while we get sound effects from a Looney Tunes cartoon. The effect is that the first half of the movie does feel like a cartoon. Except, of course, by the constant slow-motion close up shots of the faces or random body parts of certain characters (particularly Nicole Kidman’s face) that are inserted throughout the flick, to emphasize drama. Then the second half is intent on going through the predictable motions of a screenplay that’s been out of fashion for 40 years, while we basically run through the motions of several Broadway stage numbers. The story itself is basically pointless, and uninteresting. The writing is quite odd at the beginning, providing some occasional entertainment (as well as several stupid attempts at jokes), and then just goes limp, taking itself seriously while all the characters basically behave like idiots.
The story itself (which has nothing to do with the previous movies named “Moulin Rouge!”, except for Paris, Toulouse Lautrec – who here is a buffoon, not a tragic figure- and the brothel) is about a young writer arriving to the most bohemian place in the world, who winds up by chance involved in a play, and then gets a chance to meet the local star actress/prostitute, amid some confusion. They eventually fall in love, although she’s been promised to the standard evil rich jerk, so their love must be clandestine. They wind up producing a play based on their romance. However, she’s dying, the rich jerk is deadly jealous, and there’s a lot of internal pressures from the people working in the brothel turned theatre. Thus, it is all a doomed affair, and rather pointless. This movie just screams “Broadway adaptation wannabe”, and the director can’t seem to figure out that his bizarre manner of shooting this makes no sense, since his bizarre touches never seem to fit in with anything that is going on, nor seem to serve a purpose. It was probably meant to be an interesting, energetic way of telling the story (recall, this Moulin Rouge has an exclamation mark at the end of its title), which works enough to carry your slight interest throughout most of the film, but eventually it falls flat as it trips over its own ridiculousness and hollowness.
And this movie does not deserve to have me write any more about it. Screw the nominations and awards…
Bizarreness level: 7 shots out of 10
Rating: 6 out of 10
Myra Breckinridge
(1970)
Directed by: Michael Sarne
Starring: Raquel Welch, Rex Reed, Mae West, Roger Herren (he
showed his ass for this flick, only to never get hired again), Farah Fawcett,
and Andy Devine, among others.
Written by: Sarne and David Giler (the producer of all the Alien
series, as well as Tales from the Crypt and its spinoffs, and The
Money Pitt, many of these which he co-wrote; would write The Parallax
View after this, and apparently had several fights with Sarne over
the final screenplay), based on a novel by Gore Vidal.
Genre: "Comedy", although it fits more that "so-bad-it's-rather-entertaining"
field.
Duration: 1 hr. 34, although it seems longer.
Availability: Recently rereleased on video. It also has
been getting on some cable channels lately, although always after midnight.
If you thought that the fact that Roger Ebert wrote the screenplay for Russ Myer's Beyond the Valley of the Dolls is very odd and rather screwy, then you've got to see this one. More proof that most professional critics have no idea what makes a good movie: they make the worst movies themselves... So who's responsible for this $4 m companion piece to Glen or Glenda? Rex Reed!
Uhm, what do you mean who's Rex Reed? You know, that annoying critic from the late 70s through the early 90s (is he still working? Unfortunately, yes), who constantly got spoofed in The Critic. Anyway, in this, his film debut, he plays Myron, a guy who decides to have a sex change operation. However, this guy is not going to be a Ru-Paul. Oh no! Even though their faces don't match, Rex Reed turns into Raquel Welch! Yep, you read that right. Welch is in this mess too! And she's not alone! Also in here are Farah Fawcett, Mae West (who followed this with the equally atrocious sex comedy Sextette), Tom Selleck (in his debut), Andy Devine, John Huston, and more! For example, as in every film where there's a short "hilarious" scene involving a doctor, the guy who plays the doctor is somebody famous doing a cameo appearance. So, who do we get? Well, what's an awful film without John Carradine?...
I wish I could describe the plot, but I have no idea what it's about. Basically, Myron transforms into Myra, a pissed off bitch who hates men. Myra is determined to destroy men and destroy Hollywood. She goes over to Hollywood and seeks out Myron's uncle, claiming to be his widow, and tries to get his inheritance. She winds up in a job as a teacher of some sort. Eventually, she decides to pick on one guy, some local stud. She not only ridicules him constantly, but eventually rapes him with a dildo in an infirmary. Then she sleeps with the guy's girlfriend. And West's character somehow fits into the mess. So is the spirit of Myron, who still hangs around, debating with Myra, or dancing with her, or doing other ridiculous things. And director Sarne was probably on so many acids that he decided to insert clips from "classic" movies into the film, like, oh, each 4 seconds. They are supposed to be comparisons or metaphors to what is going on, but they feel like in most films that use that technique: out of place, ridiculous, and detracting. All in all, none of it makes sense...
This movie is a mess, and gives you one headache after another. No joke, THIS IS ONE OF THE WORST MOVIES EVER MADE. On the other side, the dialogue is unintentionally hilarious, and the presence of the named actors is so embarrassing that you have to laugh at them. What the heck Raquel Welch was thinking is beyond my mind (hey, this was only 4 years after 1000000 BC and Fanstastic Voyage), but she produces some great laughs... in the wrong direction. It also proves once again that HOLLYWOOD DOES NOT KNOW HOW TO SPOOF ITSELF! (when will they learn?)
I HAVE to point out that the director didn't get a shot at the chair again for over 2 decades.
Bizarreness level: 9 shots out of 10.
Rating: 1 out of 10
Naked Lunch See Cronenberg section.
Natural Born Killers
(1994)
Directed by: Oliver Stone (Platoon, JFK, Born
on the 4th of July)
A movie filled with so many striking images is hard to describe in words.
[FULL REVIEW COMING SOON!]
Bizarreness level: 9 shots out of 10.
Rating: 10 out of 10.
Natural Selection
(1999)
Directed by: Mark Bristol (some guy from Austin who did storyboards
for local movies like Dazed and Confused and Return of the Texas
Chainsaw Massacre, or Austin-related stuff like The Thin Red Line,
as well as Beatician and the Beast, Love & a .45, and
Blank
Check)
Starring: Michael Bowen (Magnolia, Jackie Brown,
Beverly
Hills Cop III, Valley Girl, Night of the Comet,
Iron
Eagle, Less than Zero), Darren Burrows (Northen Exposure,
976-Evil,
Casualties
of War, Amistad), David Carradine, Elizabeth Barondes (Oscar,
Adrenalin: Fear the Rush, Night of the Scarecrow), Missy
Atwood, Bob Balaban, Stephen Root.
Written by: B.J. Burrow and Allen Odom.
An indie flick that attempts to be a satire on serial killers and media coverage/glorification of them. Unfortunately, it's awfully lame. For moments, it's a mockumentary, where the relatives, friends, neighbors, and experts give the recount of the event, each person more whacked than the next. The rest of the moments, its a typical indie comedy that rips off Natural Born Killers. Either part only works sporadically, and there's far too many annoying characters. It gets watered down by the fact that there are two killers, and one of them looks like an anorexic Christian Slater. David Carradine is in this mess as a serial killer hunter who acts more like a witch hunter or Man in Black on Crack, for he has several loose screws himself.
The whole joke is that the main serial killer is a postal worker, who places stamps on his victims' foreheads. He's also an angry redneck, so in the documentary section we get his redneck relatives (who provide the only good joke, when one of them constantly swings around a rifle mindlessly). But the irony is that the actual methods and moments of killing of the killer are nearly non-existant. Actually, the whole movie floats around aimlessly, and gets quite tiring, to the extent that you feel like shouting "focus! focus!" even though the movie is well projected. A lot of the actors are overacting, thus becoming far too obnoxious. It would have been better if Bristol & co. would have done either the movie or the mockumentary, not both, since they are unable to mesh both well successfully, or fully develop either. And I know a lot of people in Texas find parodies of smalltown Texan airheads and their regionalisms to be hilarious, but some of those inside jokes don't carry well outside of the state.
The result for me was that I felt like becoming a mass murderer, and taking the lives of most of the people involved in this mess. Seriously, some movies are independent because they are so bad or mediocre that no one would ever finance them. This is one of them.
Bizarreness level: 3 shots out of 10
Rating: 4 out of 10
Nekromantik
(1987)
Directed by: Jorg Buttgereit (Schramm, Der Todesking)
Genre: Black Comedy
It's all what you think and less... Yes, yes, I know that some tout this as a great horror movie, but there's no horror in here. And yes, they say it is a movie dealing with necrophilia, but it is not a porn film. It's just a sick black comedy, which does not produce fond memories.
It starts out with a woman peeing. Then she gets into a car and has the oddest accident ever, in which she dies along with her mate. Next we get to meet the highway cleaning crew. We follow one guy, who decides to take a skeletal grey corpse to home. There he and his wife have sex with it. Life is happy for them, until he loses his job as a cleanup man, and thus cannot provide more corpses. So the wife takes off, and she takes the corpse with her. He then becomes insane, and wanders around a lot. Along the way he watches a bad movie, has sex with a girl in a graveyard, and then kills the girl. When he's discovered by a caretaker, he kills the caretaker as well (in a very bloody and intentionally - as well as unintentionally - hilarious scene). Getting no other satisfaction from life, he commits a sort of hara kiri. This causes his dick to swell up, and to ejaculate not unlike the sex scene in the Wayans' Scary Movie. The end.
It's all done in a gritty style, for the most part. The film employed
is cheap, the shots are too economical, the effects are hilariously bad
(yet one gets the sense that they are supposed to be bad, since they are
so overdone), there's little lighting, and there's not much of a screenplay.
However, Buttgereit manages to insert a parody of art films, piano music
and all, in the scene of the 3-way with the cadaver. And there's
a slightly amusing movie-within-a-movie scene. But overall, it only
sporadically entertaining, many times just being ridiculous. For
cult film completists and the morbidly curious only.
Bizarreness level: 9 out of 10.
Rating: 5 out of 10.
Nowhere
(1997)
Directed and Written by: Gregg Araki (The Doom Generation,
The
Living End, Splendor, Totally F***ed Up)
Starring: James Duvall (The Doom Generation, Independence
Day, Go), Rachel True (The Craft), Kathleen Robertson
(Beverely Hills 90210, Liar's Edge, Splendor), Joshua
Gibran Mayweather (Candyman: Farewell to the Flesh, The American
President), Christina Applegate (Married... With Children, Jessie,
Don't
Tell Mom the Babysitter's Dead - NO, she is not nude in this film,
for the last time!), Sarah Lassez (Roosters), Jaason Simmons (Baywatch),
Ryan Phillippe (54, I Know What You Did Last Summer, Cruel
Intentions), Heather Graham (Boogie Nights,
Austin Powers:
The Spy Who Shagged Me, Bowfinger), among many others.
Cameos: Debi Mazar, Beverely D'Angelo, John Ritter (you have
to see THIS one!), Denise Richards, Traci Lords, Gibby Haynes (as the host
of the coolest party, of course), Shannon Doherty, Rose McGowan, among
others.
Another good (though plotless) spoof by Araki of the so-called Gen X
films.
[FULL REVIEW SOON!]
Bizarreness level: 9 shots out of 10.
Rating: 7 out of 10
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