Do I really need to mention how weird/awesome Christopher Walken is in this movie? Of course not -- so I won't.

BILOXI BLUES -- originally posted on Tumblr, 5/25/11

I remember eating with my family at Hometown Buffet once, back in 1995, and some time after that I asked my parents why there hadn't been any return visits to that establishment, and they were like “uh, yeah, we won’t do that again”, which I didn’t understand because while it didn’t knock me out or make a great impression on me, I remember liking the food. Flash-forward to 2011, and now I’m an adult and Goddamn it, I’m going to have a meal at Hometown Buffet because I want to. So I went to my local HB and a while later after eating my fill, guess what?

Uh, yeah, I won’t do that again.

The food isn’t bad, all it needs is a little salt, pepper, ketchup and mustard – which also happens to be a line in the film Biloxi Blues, regarding the food they served at the Army chow hall. I love that line, it’s quite possibly the best way to describe any meal that is less than flavorful. Speaking of which, I remembered when I went to see Julie & Julia in the theater and when the scene came up where Amy Adams’ husband takes out a salt shaker and sprinkles liberal amounts all over his serving of the boeuf bourguignon Adams made, I could tell who the foodies in the audience were because they were the ones who gasped when he did that shit.

Anyway, I’m not here to talk about that particularly wonderful film that managed to combine two things that I love (food and Amy Adams), I’m talking about Biloxi Blues.

I’ve seen this film countless times growing up, thanks to HBO, and as a result, I remember it fondly and it’s in that special category of films, the category of I’ll Watch The Whole Thing If I Come Across It On Cable.

I don’t recall ever laughing out loud at this movie in the past, but then again, I’m unfortunately a difficult person to make laugh and therefore I give the appearance of Daria at the movie theater, but I guess I’m more of a laughing-on-the-inside type. I wish I could be like the guys in Biloxi Blues who are just about pissing/shitting themselves in laughter while watching an Abbott & Costello short. Doesn’t mean Biloxi Blues isn’t funny, because it is, I guess it was more of a chuckle type of comedy for me. Who says they all have to be knee-slappers? At least I chuckled a lot during this.

Maybe I just like how pleasant the whole movie feels, which is interesting because most of it consists of the characters being put through very uncomfortable situations — long forced marches through the hot (Africa hot!) swamps and dirt roads of Biloxi, Mississippi, constant punishments consisting of push-ups (which START at 100!), hourly opportunities for humiliation, and then of course, there’s the food.

Perhaps it’s not supposed to be the most realistic, since what this movie (and the play it’s based on) really is, is some rose-colored lenses kinda shit, looking fondly at the past. I mean, at the end of the movie Eugene Jerome pretty much sums it up, saying that at the time he was going through it, he hated Basic Training and wasn’t too crazy about the people there, but now he loves (read: misses) every damn one of them. To be honest, that hit me harder than Richard Dreyfuss’ final written lines about never again having friends like the ones he had when he was a boy, in the film Stand by Me, the one based on a short story by that Green Goblin-looking motherfucker and directed by that one fat fucker (no, the other one).

“Because I was young” says Eugene, when explaining part of the reason why he loved that part of his life in retrospect. Goddamn, don’t I know the feeling. I’m surprised by the shit I look back on and even more surprised that I get a tad wistful about it, something I never thought I’d feel during the time I was going through it. I’m trying not to feel this way, I’m trying to appreciate my time now because I know that as old as I feel (I go through the Renewal process during the fiery ritual of Carousel in less than a couple of months), I’m still pretty damn young in the scheme of things. There are people 10 years older than me who wish they were my age, but the bitch of it is that I feel the same way about kids 10 years younger than me. I don’t know what to do about it, but if there is a God, and if I somehow manage to hustle my way to the pearly gates at the end of my life, well, that motherfucker has a LOT to answer for when I get to him.

Stuff that was merely amusing as a kid, plays a lot better with the hindsight of Having Gone Through It, like the scene where Eugene loses his virginity to a prostitute. I remember the awkwardness of the deflowering process (nice romantic language there, chief) during My First Time, and having paid for it once, I also remember the awkwardness of getting it on with a woman who pretends to be all into you (the girlfriend experience) but basically sees you as another ready-to-assemble widget on the assembly line, so to speak.

I wasn’t in the military, so I can’t really relate to that experience, the closest thing I can come up with as far as relating to the experience of bonding with a group of guys who I never knew and probably never would’ve bothered knowing, was when I was assigned to bunk in the same room with a bunch of them at camp. Yeah, I’m talking about going to camp — in my case, it was what I derisively call Martial Arts Camp because I can’t remember the official name for it. Back when I studied taekwondo during my pre-teen years, our entire school would to the woods every summer for about two weeks to enjoy nature and to hang out with other martial arts schools. I don’t know if they still do that, but it would be cool if they did, because it was lots of fun and you made lots of friends — friends you never kept in contact with afterwards, of course.

You know, there was a time where I seriously considered joining the military; I’d had done the research and visited the recruiter and all of that. I even got in prime shape. Then something happened: I got a job. Suddenly, the idea of serving my country didn’t sound nearly as appealing as getting a nice-sized paycheck. Patriotism is strongest in the very poor and very rich, I’ve learned. Some time after that, 9/11 happened; I did the math and realized that I would’ve been out of Basic and among the first shipped to Iraq. I had also realized that I was never really ready for military life, despite how I felt otherwise.

I wanted the discipline, the knowledge, the exercise, hell, even the shitty food, but most importantly, I wanted to come out knowing I had What It Takes to be a soldier in the Army. But I guess I also wanted to get through it without having to make the Ultimate Sacrifice. Hell, it’s not even so much that I was afraid of dying (that’s something I’ve unfortunately not only made peace with, but even welcomed the idea of during the darkest moments of my life so far), or that I was afraid of coming back missing a leg or something (medical science is pretty goddamn amazing for not accomplishing jack shit with Cancer, MS, muscular dystrophy, AIDS, the common cold, etc). What I was really afraid of, was coming back from war with less than 100% in the emotional/psychological department. Now THAT, that scared/scares the shit out of me.

I guess what I really wanted was the Eugene Jerome experience: everything but the whole going-to-war thing.

Anyway, it had been at least 10 years since I saw Biloxi Blues in its entirety, and it was just as Good Times watching it a few hours ago. It holds up, thank God, since many fondly remembered childhood re-watches rarely do, and it’s even funnier now, which was a surprise. Seriously, I laughed out loud a couple of times. The DVD I watched was also the first time I got to see this flick in its original 2:35.1 aspect ratio; my many HBO/Encore viewings had always been in 4:3, which wasn’t that bad since the movie was shot in Super 35, but it was cool to see the original theatrical compositions — sure, I miss being able to see Park Overall’s entire leg as she lounges back in bed, waiting for Eugene to man up, but that’s such a minor damn-near-nonexistent quibble, and such is the give-and-take of that troublesome format, anyway.

It’s also the first time I really took notice of the long takes Mike Nichols used in this movie; it’s not done in a show-offy way, I just think maybe Nichols likes using long takes, and besides, shooting that way kind of lends itself to the material’s roots on the stage. Yet the movie rarely feels like a “filmed play”, which is an easy pitfall when you’re adapting this kind of shit (props to that Jaws-shooting motherfucker Bill Butler as well). I particularly enjoyed one scene between Matthew Broderick’s Eugene Jerome and Penelope Ann Miller’s Daisy Flanagan; they meet, chat, have a slow dance to Pat Suzuki’s cover of “How High The Moon”, and say goodbye — all in a few minutes, all in one long shot that manages to be awesome without ever yelling to the audience just how fucking awesome it is. This is the loveliest Ms. Miller has ever looked in a movie, by the way, she looks exactly like what a fond memory of a first love would look like.

Plus, some dude gets in trouble for blowing another dude, so there’s that too, if you’re looking for it.

It’s not Full Metal Jacket, nor is it supposed to be. It’s Neil Simon fondly looking back at a time in his life that he wasn’t so happy with while it was happening. Come to think of it, that’s life in general — you never fully appreciate certain moments of your life until they’ve passed; it’s like that Joni Mitchell song (or the Janet Jackson song featuring Joni Mitchell, if you’re too young for the original) whose name I can’t remember. But to be fair, you need the benefit of hindsight to ever truly appreciate something, anyway, because it’s only after the fact that you know how something played out. Kinda like a movie; some movies play better the second time around because the suspense and agita that comes with wondering How The Fuck Will This End is no longer affecting you, now you can just take in the performances, writing and scenery. Written like a true asshole.

Anyway, if you haven’t seen it, I think you should. It’s not a great movie, but it’s one I really enjoyed over the years and maybe a movie doesn’t have to be filled with cinematic virtuosity and painfully human portrayals of characters to be great — maybe it just has to be the kind of movie that makes you feel good while watching it, and this one is.

Listen, going back to how I started this entry: I’m not completely dissing Hometown Buffet or the people who like eating there, if anything I envy those who enjoy the place. One positive thing I can say about it is that you can eat, then take a break and let the food digest while you – I don’t know, I’m just creating an example here – write some ramblings on your laptop about a movie you recently watched that you intend to post later. Then, after you feel like you can continue, you put away the laptop and continue eating the underwhelming food. Because you have no shame, hypocrisy is like oxygen to you, and your maw is always open, always demanding for more foodstuffs to be jammed down your gullet, you fat fuck.

Days of running around unwashed and shooting people or screwing over Sam Shepard

BADLANDS/DAYS OF HEAVEN -- originally posted on Tumblr, 5/25/11

 

What a fucking treat to know that the new Terrence Malick joint is already hitting theaters shortly after winning the Palme D’Or at Cannes; usually you have to read all the written fellatio online or in newspapers and then wait at least six months before the fuckin’ movie hits theaters Stateside. But The Tree of Life comes out in about a couple days, and I decided to use this as an excuse to revisit his previous films — which is great because I’m always looking for an excuse to watch a Malick film again. It’s safe to say he’s one of my all-time favorite filmmakers.

I had a double feature earlier this early morning of the first two joints in his oeuvre; the showtime was unintentional, it just worked out that way. But watching them that late at night/early in the morning is a cool way to watch a Malick flick because afterwards you can step outside and take a walk while the sun is slowly rising and the grass & leaves have that morning dew on them and you’re still under the fuckin’ Terrence Malick Nature Spell, that shit is 10x more of an experience. 

 

Your receptors to that kind of shit are really open after watching one his films; like the pupils of your eyes opening wide from being in a dark room, right before you suddenly step out into some bright light, then you’re like AIIIIEEE in a good way. Fully owned by your surroundings (without the use of weed!), you walk down the nearly empty streets, taking in blue-tinted morning, and then stop at the awesome donut shop that has fresh & hot donuts at this time and inhale them because you love the idea of dropping dead of fat-related illness before 40.

You know, there was a time long ago when I considered Badlands a good-but-not-great movie, one that showed Malick’s potential that would go fully/better explored in future films. That was also the time when I had suffered from severe breathing problems as a result of having my head fully implanted up my ass. I say this because watching this film again after a six-year gap from the last time I watched it, I’m now declaring that this motherfucker Malick had it going the fuck on from the start. From the fucking first frame of film, he had it. I guess his is what most would call an “assured debut”, and by “most”, I mean me.

Perfect casting man, that’s what Badlands has; Martin Sheen is great as this James Dean-looking dude, he exudes enough of that cool/dangerous vibe about him that it makes sense why a bored teenage girl would think of him as dreamy. And I liked how casual he makes it look when he kills someone, but he’s not some MWAHAHA psycho, either. I don’t think he necessarily enjoys it, it’s more like something he feels he has to do because there’s no other way around it — and yet, it comes so easy to him.

Like, I think he hates it when he shoots someone and then realizes they’re still alive because it means he now has to choose to finish the victim off or not. He picks the latter and waits for them to die of their wounds, or in the case of that one couple in the shed, he doesn’t even check, he’d rather assume he got them and takes off. I don’t think it’s some kind of psycho enjoyment deal, I think he can only commit to the deed as far as shooting them and then hoping they’re dead because the last thing he wants to do is shoot them again. What a fuckin’ weirdo.

Sissy Spacek, to my knowledge, was only hot in one movie — Prime Cut — and that was it, after that, she had more of the attractive vibe to her without actually being attractive, if that makes sense (and it doesn’t). She’s great, she looks the part and she manages to make it come across that while she’s not dumb, most of her narration shows how dim and/or eager-to-believe she is to accept Sheen’s justifications for the things he does. If she ever objects to any of this, she certainly isn’t showing/telling, at least not in some showy This Is Wrong kind-of-way. Sometimes it’s best just to walk away and let the other guy make up his mind.

Malick himself shows up as some dude who gets assed out of visiting the rich dude Sheen & Spacek are currently holding hostage. Supposedly someone else was gonna play the part and he didn’t show up, so my man T.M. played that shit. Nowadays he’s all fuckin’ sensitive about having his picture taken, but he didn’t seem to mind acting in his first movie. Maybe he figured that was good enough; he was about 30 or so when he made that movie, and that’s as good as he was ever going to look, so maybe he doesn’t mind having that as his reference. Except there’s also that picture of him that was taken of him on the set of The Thin Red Line with this Well How About That? look on his face, and now I see that there are some recent pics at a couple award ceremonies. I don’t know where I’m going with this now, so I’ll move on.

He’s kind of an enigma, this dude; on the one hand, you have actors on his last couple films go on about what a fucking master he is at his craft, and how wonderful it was to watch him work, and on the other, you read about how he wasn’t the most actor-friendly on Days of Heaven and you’re wondering Just What In The Fuck Am I Supposed To Believe Here?

Maybe both stories are true, maybe he was more about visuals with his ‘78 joint and during his 20-year hiatus, he learned how to rock a thespian’s world while trying to shoot a pretty picture. There’s a pretty awesome book called “Easy Riders, Raging Bulls”, and that Jewfro-wearing motherfucker Peter Biskind writes about how Malick shot miles and miles of footage, went overbudget, then took about two years to find the movie in editing. Luckily the film ended up a masterpiece, because otherwise I don’t think we’d hear from that motherfucker ever again.

It’s like with Michael Cimino; granted he spent tons more cash and time making Heaven’s Gate, but if that film ended up being a box-office success and award-winner, his maddening style of shooting would’ve been justified. But it wasn’t, so now people bring up the examples of how he filmed and edited that shit as What Not To Do.

I mean, David Fincher shoots about as much footage as Michael Cimino did and no one is bitching/warning others about his method. But then again, Fincher stays on budget, that probably saved him right there. Same with the late Stanley Kubrick (as opposed to the alive-and-well Stanley Kubrick who’s living next door to me, playing his fuckin’ Steely Dan albums way too fuckin’ loud); his movie shoots lasted longer than most Italian governments but because he used a small crew and had it down to a science, his budgets were no bigger than your average Hollywood film.

Biskind also wrote something that I’m not quite ready to believe (that tends to happen with a lot of the shit Biskind writes), about how once Malick was sitting down and brought himself up by grabbing onto producer Edward R. Pressman’s ear and pulling from it. Holy shit, if that’s true, then Malick isn’t quite the peaceful, introspective nature-lover that his movies lead you to believe he is. Besides, doesn’t it take about seven pounds of pressure to pull a motherfucker’s ear off? Malick’s a big dude and the most recent photo of Pressman shows him with both ears intact. Maybe Malick was just holding it to freak Pressman out while he stood up, like Look What I Can Fuckin’ Do To Your Ear If I Wanted To.

Richard Gere is in this and if I gave a shit about him, I’d continue, so instead let me talk a bit about Brooke Adams. Again, typically perfect casting in a Malick joint. She’s very pretty but she also has an air of the street about her; she looks like she came from hard times, whereas most actresses who try to play like they’re slumming it look like princesses playing make-believe and I don’t buy ‘em. You know she’s married to Tony Shalhoub? I didn’t, but good work, Monk.

Sam Shepard is in this movie too, and watching him on the beautiful Criterion Blu-ray, I think here he looks like a guy who probably had a one-night-stand menage with Jim Carrey’s mom and Denis Leary’s mom, then after he shot his load and they were like “Call us?”, he was all “See ya later, sluts — I have plays to write because the stage, she waits for no man!”

I guess the narration in Days of Heaven wasn’t originally part of the movie, that was some shit Malick came up with while trying to figure out how to edit the motherfucker. I really like it, it has such a rambling, stream-of-consciouness feel and plus Linda Manz has a serious fuckin’ low-class city accent, it’s hilarious. The unrehearsed/unprepared-sounding narration also makes a fantastic contrast to the expertly-composed/beautifully-lit visuals.

To be honest, the story isn’t as important to me in these joints and I don’t think they are to Malick, either. Otherwise, I’d be able to hear the fuckin’ dialogue clearly, over the ultra-crisp sounds of the breeze passing through the wheat fields, or the tweeting of birds or the running of a stream. Even Ennio Muthafuckin’ Morricone’s beautiful music has to take a backseat to The Sounds of Nature. Compared to all of that, the dialogue is very mumbly and low — Malick’s all like Mumblecore THIS, You Motherfuckers.

Or maybe it’s not so much that Malick doesn’t care about story — fuck that, he cares a lot about story — it’s that he doesn’t particularly care about the blah blah blah coming out the actor’s mouths. The characters talk because you have to give the actors something to say, that way they don’t bitch and complain, but the visuals tell you everything you need to know about what’s going. That’s why what little dialogue there is, is pretty cut down to the bone.

Terrence Malick joints really do need to be seen on the biggest screen you can find; I think the reason why I probably liked Badlands a whole lot more this time is that I was watching it from my projector (which I didn’t have, the last time I saw Badlands). Man, the projector is one of the best investments I ever made (back when I had that kind of cash to throw away) and I highly recommend getting one if you can. You don’t even have to get a top of the line one, at least I don’t think so, just get one that is bright and displays a big image.

Granted, I’ve never been anal about line-resolution and stuff like that — the older rig I have only goes to 720p, and I’m sure your average contributor to Home Theater Magazine would scoff at my setup and the highest praise he’d give it is “quaint”, but that’s OK, I’m happy with it and maybe one day I’ll have the cash to upgrade to some 1080p shit. 

 

Besides, I’d never invite some Home Theater Magazine asshole over to my crib, I don’t need his shit, not unless I can kick him in the balls after and film him go OWWWWEEEEEEOWWWWEEEEEEEEEOWWWWUUUUURRRRROWWW (people only say “My nuts!” or “My balls!” in Steven Seagal movies) and then I can upload it on YouTube and then maybe it’ll show up on Tosh.O and Daniel Tosh can say something hilariously mean about it because all comedians are sad and have low self-esteem and need to hurt other people’s feelings in the name of Comedy when you get right down to it.

Coffee enemas and soul-sucking aliens

CROCODILE DUNDEE IN LOS ANGELES -- originally posted on Tumblr, 5/18/11

Believe it or not, time has been kind to this movie. Not that I’ve seen it before; I bought this along with 61 other used DVD’s at a Blockbuster Video going-out-of-business sale last year, and I’m finally seeing it now.

What I mean about time being kind is that there are a couple of jokes in this movie that might have been amusing to the audience during it’s original theatrical run, but now, ten years later — JESUS CHRIST, IT’S BEEN TEN YEARS ALREADY?! — these bits play pretty goddamn hilarious and/or fucked-up.

I mean, there’s a scene where Mick “Crocodile” Dundee is at a Hollywood party and a crowd has gathered around him as he tells crazy stories about his friend Mel Gibson. Only he’s talking about Malcolm “Mal” Gibson, some guy from the outback he knew back in the day, not the movie star. I think back in 2001, the joke was supposed to be Ha Ha Ha, how funny that one of our most-loved movie stars is being confused with a guy that constantly gets in trouble with the cops (Mick complains about having had to bail him out of jail twice). But now in 2011, now that Mel Gibson is better known as a drunk-driving, anti-Semitic, alleged wife-beater/recorded blow job-demander, it really plays differently.

The crowd of wannabes and gonna-bes and currently-ares react to Mick’s stories with a mix of shock and laughter, they’re getting a huge kick out of this crocodile hunter telling tales out of school, but I think if this movie was made today, the crowd would’ve just reacted like “Meh, what else is new?”

What am I saying? That scene would’ve never been shot if this movie was made in 2011, they’d probably change it to them thinking he was talking about Hugh Jackman or that guy from Avatar.

Another joke that probably plays funnier now (unfortunately) than it did ten years ago was the scene where Mick is driving on the freeway but suddenly stops because his son claims to see a dog in the road. This causes a huge traffic jam, followed by a miscommunication between Mick and the frustrated drivers that leads to cops and news helicopters showing up because everyone else thinks there’s a bomb situation.

After 9/11, anything bomb-related obviously has to be grounds for a filmmaker to Go There when it comes to terrorist humor (see: Harold and Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay), but in the spring of 2001, things were different in the good ol’ USA — candy bars cost a nickel, people weren’t in so much of a hurry, and terrorist bombings came from good ‘ol White Americans, not some savage who wants to score with 70 inexperienced girls.

There’s a school teacher in this movie, she’s attractive and lonely, and that pissed me off because it brought back memories of the attractive schoolteachers I had in junior high — when puberty and new feelings were thrust upon me like a stripper to a rapper with expensive gold chains. In retrospect, I should’ve made a move. I mean, what’s the worst that could’ve happened? She says no? She calls my parents? Shit, my dad would’ve probably taken me aside once we got home and give me a high-five, then afterwards he would’ve gone somewhere private by himself and cry tears of joy that his son wasn’t nearly as fruity as he appeared.

Speaking of The Gay, there’s a scene where Mick and his buddy Jacko go out on the town; they stop at Wendy’s for a meal and then look for a bar to have a few pitchers. Naturally, they end up at a Western-themed gay bar which they promptly exit from. Take a guess at what song was playing during that scene, I’ll give you a hint: it’s the song co-written by Paul Shaffer that they always play to signify some gay/comedy shit is about to happen. If I ever make a movie with a scene like that, I’m gonna bring back “El Bimbo” aka The Blue Oyster Bar theme from Police Academy. Mick and his bud refer to the gays as “poofters”, yet half a minute later, they get mugged by a group of hoods who call them “fools” even though it’s obvious the actors are saying “faggots” but the shit was dubbed over for whatever reason.

I actually liked this more than Crocodile Dundee II, because it continues with the genial feel of the original, rather than suddenly putting on an earring and leather pants, trying to convince you it’s Hard now, like the sequel. The first one was a nice & friendly movie, but the second one had motherfuckers getting machine-gunned and sniper’d, and even though I liked it, it just didn’t feel right; it’s like talking to Henry Winkler for an hour and because he’s Henry Winkler, you’re totally charmed by what a nice guy he is. You share this with Henry and he stands back a bit, looking a tad offended. Then he pulls a knife on you and you’re like “Oh Henry, you’re so cute when you’re trying to be scary” and he’s like “No, I’m serious, I’m going to cut you” and you’re like “Whatever, dude” and suddenly he jabs you in the arm, giving you a small cut and you’re like “What the FUCK, Henry Winkler?”

Crocodile Dundee in Los Angeles eventually gets into some gangster shit, and sure enough, it’s the weakest shit in the movie. But the rest of the stuff, the stuff involving, uh, Crocodile Dundee in Los Angeles, is amusing and not nearly as lame as I thought it would be. It’s mid-level sitcom humor, and the climax feels like you’re watching the climax to the most hardcore nonexistent multi-part episode of Family Matters or Step by Step ever made; you keep expecting to hear a laugh track and whoops and hollers from the audience as Mick dispatches a bad guy with a papier-mache cow, just like they would had it been Urkel or Cody who had done that shit.

The movie looks and feels like a TV-movie sequel to a big-budget theatrical film — it doesn’t help that this was shot in flat 1:85.1 aspect ratio rather than the anamorphic 2:35.1 ratio that the last two films were shot in. But for what it is, it’s a decent time-killer. With some minor trims, I wouldn’t be surprised to see this play on ABC Family or PAX or ION or whatever the fuck that channel is called. I spent about $1 on the DVD and 94 minutes on watching it, which sounds about right.

Oh yeah, one more thing: Paul Rodriguez is in this movie which reminded me of the time my mother met him at a 7-11 during a road trip. Of course, when she saw him, she said “A Million To Juan!” as opposed to his given name. According to my mom, Mr. Rodriguez was very nice to her. A couple years later, I found her watching television in the den, and Paul Rodriguez was being interviewed on some interview show; she said that by looking at his eyes, she could tell the man was a pot-smoker. You can tell that anyone is a pot-smoker by looking at their eyes, she told me. I nodded in agreement and then went back into my room to continue smoking a bowl.

LIFEFORCE -- originally posted on Tumblr, 5/18/11

Lifeforce gets more insane with each viewing; the first time I saw this flick, I was 8 years old and I was just kinda like Whuuh? and the second time I saw it was back in ‘00 and I was like Whaaa? and now I just finished watching it for the third time and I’m all like Whaaat da fuuuck?

I’m pretty sure the opening narration (on the international cut) was done by an unbilled John Larroquette, much like his uncredited voice work on Tobe Hooper’s first film, The Texas Chain Saw Massacre. Anyway, I dug the narration because I’m not sure it’s even necessary and the main purpose seems to be so the audience wouldn’t ask why nobody on the Space Shuttle Churchill is floating in zero-gravity even though they’re in fuckin’ space.

Yeah man, it starts out in space where this combo crew of Americans (fuck yeah) and Brits (quite all right) are going to check out Halley’s Comet because that’s what people were all about in 1985. I was like 4 or 5 when I heard about Halley’s Comet and I wanted to see that shit, so my parents actually took me to Griffith Observatory to attend a comet viewing around 4 or 5 in the morning, except the weather decided to fuck us all by clouding that shit up something awful. The people in charge cancelled the viewing which was a bummer but at least we found a really good donut place afterwards.

So, the leader of the astronauts is played by Steve Railsback and I wonder if this was the only time he was ever given the lead in a big budget spectacle like this; I’m guessing this movie and The Stunt Man were the only ones. He and the other astronauts discover a large 150-mile-long skinny umbrella-looking thing with dessicated monster bats inside, oh, and three very naked humanoids.

The shit just gets crazier after that; the main humanoid (who’s name is Space Girl, according to the credits) walks around naked, hypnotizing her poor victims with her pretty face, beautiful body, and more importantly, her great breasts. Then she sucks the life energy out of them (the victims, not her breasts) and the circle of soul-sucking begins. You find out later that these Space Vampires learn everything about their prey before starting the whole Lifeforce game, and I guess if we were a more evolved species, she’d have to charm us with a great personality, but no, just a nice pair of tit-tays will do.

Space Girl also has two fellow Space Vampires, these two naked guys and that’s where the horror begins, if you ask me. Who wants to see that shit? Certainly not a couple guards at the Space Research Centre, where the humanoids were placed under surveillance (in their see-through coffins, no less!). The two guys, they wake up and explode out of the coffins, and then stare at the two Brit guards. These guards, they look ‘em over, see these handsome naked men in great shape, already they’re threatened. Then the two naked guys start walking towards them and being Real Heterosexual Men (with the homophobic baggage that comes with that designation), the guards then proceed to ventilate these guys with machine guns. It’s like “I’m not fuckin’ gay!”, they have to kill these fruits before they catch up to the guards and, I don’t know, turn them into gays as well. I’m reminded of that scene in that one episode of The Simpsons — one of their Halloween specials — when Homer kills the zombie Ned Flanders and then you find out that Homer didn’t even know Ned was a zombie.

This isn’t an insult, I love the look of the movie and I’m not sure if the shit was intentional, but while this movie was made in 1985, the color scheme, lighting and shot compositions really made it feel like I was watching some unreleased sci-fi/horror joint that had been sitting on the vault since 1967. Even the acting is awesome in that British sort-of-way, it’s like no matter how fucking out there and ridiculous the settings and dialogue, these guys are giving it the utmost importance, like it was fuckin’ Shakespeare. They’re wrong, however, this shit ain’t Shakespeare — it’s fuckin’ way better than Shakespeare. I don’t remember seeing Viola and Maria in Twelfth Night have blood shoot out of their orifices and then have that blood form into Orsino, who then screams before collapsing back into a puddle of blood. I must have been in the bathroom during that part of the play.

I’ve only seen Poltergeist once, and I was really young, so I barely remember it. I’m going to have to see it again, because right now, I’m pretty sure Lifeforce might be my favorite Tobe Hooper movie. I know he made The Texas Chain Saw Massacre, but that’s kinda got a Schindler’s List thing going for me in that there’s no denying that it’s a masterpiece, but I’m not sure I want to sit through all that pain/anguish/tension again. Shit man, maybe Spielberg secretly directed that one too.

As it is, Lifeforce is just too much fuckin’ fun. I think it’s genuinely Good Times, and I don’t know how serious this shit’s supposed to be taken, but I suspect it’s not supposed to be. There are people who were upset that MST3k chose This Island Earth as the flick they were going to roast for the feature-film version of their awesome show. Not because there were better choices out there, no, because This Island Earth is actually a pretty decent movie, they say. They have to calm the fuck down and get over that shit, because decent movie or not, there’s enough there to have fun with. I feel the same way about Lifeforce; I really like this movie but I’d sure love to have seen what Joel/Mike and the bots could have done with it.

Anyway, if Reservoir Dogs was Quentin Tarantino’s unofficial Parker movie, then Lifeforce is an unofficial Quatermass movie and that’s probably a big fuckin’ reason why this shit rules your school and the school next to it.

Yeah, I'm free Tuesday to drive Joe Mantegna around

LEON: THE PROFESSIONAL -- originally posted on Tumblr, 5/14/11

So I just finished watching the long version of Leon; I thought the long version was the director’s cut, but it turns out that the shorter version that came out back in ‘94 as The Professional is the director’s cut. I guess it was widely assumed that Luc Besson got raked over the coals by the Hollywood suits over bad test screenings, but that wasn’t the case, he only had to cut one scene and that was due to the audience’s nervous laughter during said scene — and I think that was his choice, he wasn’t even forced to cut it.

The scene involved Natalie Portman’s character straight out asking Jean Reno’s character to deflower her. She was like, 11 or 12, so yeah, I could see why most people in the audience couldn’t stop tittering and/or squirming. The sad thing is that I Just Fucking Know there were at least a few guys in that crowd who were probably trying to contain their erections.

What makes that scene even more uncomfortable to watch is that when Leon refuses, his explanation is that it’s because the last time he had a girlfriend he was 19 and he wouldn’t make “a good lover” for Mathilda. The fact that he’s an adult (Reno was 44-45 during production of Leon) and that it’s wrong to fuck 12-year-old girls never enters into this argument.

But I’m not going to judge Besson and I’m not going to cry Moral Outrage over that shit, instead I’m going to give him points for having the fuckin’ stinky French balls to write a scene like that, send it to producers and financiers, having those script pages sent out to casting directors, having those same script pages be sent to parents of potential Mathildas, and then shooting those script pages in a set full of mostly well-adjusted adults and one child. That’s balls, son.

And the balls get even bigger because based on what I’ve read up on the guy in the past, Besson evidently likes ‘em young enough to scream when they have their first period a la Vada Sultenfuss in My Girl. Again, I can’t really judge because over in France, the age of consent is 15 and I’m just being very much an American with our 18-year-old age of consent (in most states, anyway). You have to put into consideration our cultural differences; what we’ll accept over here, they wouldn’t accept over there and vice versa (starring Judge Reinhold and Fred Savage).

I mean, I’m sure one day I’ll be in the same room with Luc Besson and he’ll notice the firearm I have holstered at the small of my back (because I have a concealed carry permit, of course) and he’ll look at me all disgusted-like, declaring out loud “Theeez fuck-ing Amer-i-cans!” right before he turns to whatever 9-year-old piece of ass he’s currently dating and sticks his Roquefort-coated tongue down her bubble-gum-flavored throat. Then his Pequignet watch will beep and he’ll suddenly go “Sacre bleu! We’re late for your appointment at the pediatrician!” because Luc Besson speaks English like a horrible stereotype of a Frenchie.

Anyway, I saw The Professional twice back in November 1994 (opening weekend and then the following weekend), then I rented/dubbed the pan-and-scan VHS in May 1995, then I rented/dubbed the widescreen laserdisc sometime in 1996, and then never again until this version I finished watching a half-hour ago. I prefer this extended version and even though it’s something like 20 minutes longer, I think the pacing is improved, if that makes any sense. It’s a strange film, this Leon, and the longer version just adds more of that odd feel to it and that’s a plus for me.

Aside from the Please Fuck Me Jean Reno scene, there’s another fucked-up scene that takes place in a fancy restaurant, where our May-December couple is having a celebratory dinner (they just did some hits) and Mathilda is drinking champagne and I guess champagne isn’t considered alcohol in New York, either that or they paid enough to make the wait staff look the other way. Mathilda crawls over to Leon and tries to kiss him and he’s feeling all awkward (in the pants) about it and he makes her stop. Then she downs a whole flute of the bubbly and immediately goes into insane laughter for what felt like an entire minute. It’s like Natalie Portman was asked to personify the tone of the movie for this scene and that’s the result.

Speaking of Ms. Portman, I didn’t remember how fucking good she was in this movie. I mean, really! She’s really fucking good and she was 11 at the time! It’s scary how talented this kid was from the very beginning, I don’t think she ever had a shaky performance in her youth. I can only think of Jodie Foster as someone else who was that good from the beginning; they also both went on to graduate from Ivy League schools, so I guess it’s just a matter of time before Portman starts directing too-smart-for-their-own-good movies that nobody goes to see. You go, Natalie.

Shit, I just remember that the age of consent of my people in Mexico is like 12 in some areas. Fuck. I shouldn’t have talked so much shit about Besson, then. It’s too bad I’m not some disenfranchised White, otherwise I can just say something like “I knew it! That’s why we have to close the borders and keep those savages out of our beautiful county, where we can fuck 16-year-olds because we live in Alabama!” Because they all live in Alabama.

Then they’ll find out that the age of consent in Hawaii is 14 and connect that with President Obama being born in Hawaii, and that’s how the Birther movement will die: they’ll find a better way to motherfuck that Kenyan motherfucker, until that guy is no longer in office and they have a new motherfucker to cry foul over — unless it’s one of their guys, then they’ll cry foul over how their motherfucker is getting motherfucked by the motherfuckers on the other side. Politics is all motherfuckery and I won’t stand by it, and I won’t partake. I’d rather spend my time watching movies and eating Pretzel M&M’s because I’m a Pretzel M&M eating motherfucker.

UNDERWORLD (1996) -- originally posted on Tumblr, 5/14/11

 

Underworld is available on DVD, but I couldn’t find it on Netflix or any of my local video stores. Those who know about Underworld might scratch their heads in confusion as to WHY I’d want to see this movie, and that’s because they know that this movie was written by Larry Bishop and directed by Roger Christian. Bishop was famous for acting in a bunch of awesome biker movies in the 60’s and 70’s but is currently infamous for writing/directing the critically-trashed films Mad Dog Time and Hell Ride, while Roger Christian is currently in movie jail for directing Battlefield Earth (Christian was briefly released to direct a film called Bandido for writer/star Carlos Gallardo from El Mariachi but after screening the final product, he was promptly thrown back in for violating the conditions of his parole).

Anyway, I found the movie at a VHS sale, bought it, and put it away for eventual viewing. Then it suddenly popped up on Netflix Instant, meaning I wasted a dollar that could’ve gone to some lazy guy pretending to be homeless on the street, playing on my sympathy.

Like Mad Dog Time and Hell Ride, Underworld takes place in a weird alternate universe where cops don’t exist and people are trapped in the hell of constantly looking/acting/talking cool in between killing each other. Actually, Mad Dog Time is the only film in the Bishop trilogy that acknowledges this by having the narrator tell the audience that the movie takes place in a Bizarro Earth, I’m just assuming the other movies do as well.

Personally, I have my own pet theory that I just made up; I think this alternate universe, the Bishop universe, is actually some kind of purgatory where the characters who get killed in every gangster movie you ever saw ends up after they die. Shit man, maybe it’s even Hell, because even the ones who come out on top never seem to be enjoying themselves. Maybe they know it’s all going to start over again, the same ol’ talk-talk-talk, bang-bang-bang. Either that or they’re too cool to be having fun.

So Denis Leary stars as this gangster named Johnny Crown, and he’s driving around town in a limo, making stops at various gangster hideouts and fronts, and machine-gunning the shit out of any hood that happens to be there. It’s a Father’s Day massacre, because all the killing is taking place on Father’s Day and because Crown is on a revenge trip in the name of his currently brain-dead father (the guys getting got were responsible).

Along the way, he picks up this dude named Frank Gavilan (played by Joe Mantegna), and I guess they were childhood friends but Gavilan acts like he doesn’t know him, for some reason I can’t quite remember because I was dead tired and high. Everyone in this movie has really fakey-sounding names and everyone else comments on everyone else having really fakey-sounding names and it turns out it’s because everyone in this movie has a fake name, that’s why they’re so fakey-sounding.

Unlike the other two films, I wasn’t digging Underworld as much as I dug the other two. Maybe it was because of low expectations, but I genuinely liked Mad Dog Time and Hell Ride was OK; I got a kick out of Bishop’s overly-self-conscious cool theatrics and his weirdo sense-of-humor. But Underworld kind of wore out it’s welcome after about 30 minutes or so. It starts off well, with this cool soundtrack playing over shots of motherfuckers getting owned by machine gun fire intercut with hot chicks stripping. Plus, it’s pretty fuckin’ bloody and I hope whoever created the squibs for this movie got a nice bonus or something.

But then you find out that Leary’s character has a degree in psychotherapy (he was in prison for 7 years, and that’s what he did with his time), and you realize that he’s on this therapy kick in addition to his revenge kick. The rest of the movie is Leary psychobabbling Mantegna in a limo, occasionally making a quick stop to kill someone or to drop Mantegna off at a hotel so he can get some ass from Annabella Sciorra — and somehow that gets kind of dull after a while.

I think the problem is that the movie takes place during one night, in a period of a few hours, and yet Bishop couldn’t come up with enough stuff to fill up a feature-length screenplay, so instead he just has this shit get all Möbius strip on us, constantly repeating a never-ending cycle of Leary & Mantegna in the limo, Mantegna in the hotel with Sciorra, Leary kills someone or talks with someone, Leary & Mantegna in the limo, Mantegna in the hotel with Sciorra, Leary kills someone or talks with someone, etc, etc.

There is the occasional cutaway to a group of guys in a bar, and these guys don’t talk to each other, instead they just stare each other down and then shoot a glass or bottle with one of their guns. There’s a stripper doing her thing during all of this, she doesn’t seem fazed by it, and neither does the bartender, and neither did I, come to think of it. It was kinda cool that one of the shooters was James “Principal Strickland from Back to the Future” Tolkan, but even that WTF shit gets kind of old after a while.

Yeah, Roger Christian is the director but I still consider this a total Larry Bishop joint because in addition to writing it, he also acts in it (playing one of the guys Leary wants to take out — on occasion, the movie cuts to his character doing what I felt was a slow-motion version of what James Caan did near the end of Thief) and feels exactly like Bishop’s other films; the music, the performances, the lethargic-on-purpose pace, the otherworldly ambiance. The only thing that feels like Christian may have had something to do with is the look of the film; the guy won an Oscar for the art direction on Star Wars (Lucas then hired him as 2nd unit director on The Phantom Menace which makes sense in a sad way) and he worked on Alien as well, so that’s his specialty I guess, because even Battlefield Earth looked cool every once in a while.

Because I’m down with the Larry Bishop weirdness (an acquired taste, I’m sure), it wasn’t so much the dialogue and events of the story that I had issues with, it was that somewhere along the way I just started getting tired of it. This could’ve probably made an interesting 45-minute short film, but at 90 minutes you just want this guest to leave already, which I guess makes it the cinematic equivalent of me, because I’m a master of not knowing that I should leave already.

I don’t condone this practice, because I think movies should have your complete attention if you’re watching them, but Underworld is the kind of movie that you can have on and occasionally look at while you’re on the Internet or cleaning your place up or something, and you wouldn’t miss a fucking thing.

Straying like Kobe & Tiger and flip-flopping like Kerry

So I knew about Tumblr but I was happy with Blogger, and then found out that one of my ramblings was being re-posted by someone on the Tumblr, so I took a closer look at it. It seemed pretty cool, so I decided to give it a try for a while with shorter ramblings on every movie watched.

About a week-and-a-half later, the trial run is over. It's a cool site, but overall, it felt really odd to write for two different blogs at two different places. Better to just stay with the one I started with and post both my short and long ramblings here. No need to add extra work for me (and those who read my ramblings) by posting some of these wastes of time somewhere else.

Because I think Tumblr works best for non-text postings, I'll still use Tumblr for non-rambling nonsense, like screenshots of dogs peeking over logs, and links to my ramblings here will still be posted on Tumblr because there's nothing wrong with spreading the word in other ways. There's also nothing wrong with a little bump-and-grind.

Anyway, if you're on Tumblr -- here's my page, if that kind of thing matters to you. Also, Cathie Horlick, Phil Blankenship and Ellen Cobb have Tumblrs and I highly recommend you should go tumble with them or whatever the correct term for following someone on The Tumblr is. I'm going to repost my Tumblr ramblings here, so in case any of this seems way too familiar to you in the next couple of days, do not despair, you are not having crazy synapses and stroking out, I am merely being a jerk about this whole thing. Good day, sir and ma'am.