Recent Viewings, Part 2

[FatFreddysCat]

"The Onion Movie" (2007)
Based on the satirical "fake news" publication and web site, this collection of comedic sketches parodies television news and commercials, tied together by a loose storyline involving the "Onion News Network's" old school anchorman battling with the channel's new hip, young corporate ownership.
This is essentially a 21st century update of grab-bag, gag-a-minute flicks like "Kentucky Fried Movie" or "The Groove Tube." Some of the sketches are quite funny (the best is a running gag about a new Steven Seagal movie called "Cock Puncher"), but others fall completely flat. The film was shot in 2003, but had a troubled production and ended up sitting on the shelf for a few years before finally being released direct-to-video. Your mileage may vary, but I got a few decent chuckles out of it.

[FatFreddysCat]

"Soaked in Bleach" (2015)
An intriguing docudrama that uses re-enactments and interviews to examine the many questions that still surround the death of Nirvana's Kurt Cobain. Based on the research of Tom Grant, a P.I. originally hired by Courtney Love to find Kurt (who had gone missing for several days prior to his death). After Kurt's body was found, Grant began to suspect that his client had not been totally honest with him, and that Kurt's death may not have been suicide after all.

In other words, neither Grant or the filmmakers buy Courtney Love's grieving-widow act.

[M.10rda]

SPYS aka S*P*Y*S (1974):
In this low-key comedy, two rogue CIA agents run from one misadventure to another, dodging attacks from their own superiors as well as the KGB, the Red Chinese, some French terrorists, and maybe others... uhh, the script isn't that important, tbh, and in fact co-star Elliot Gould (in a making of supplemental on the DVD) claims he literally threw his copy out the window of a moving car on the first day of filming.

Gould is the schlemiel to Donald Sutherland's schlemazel, and for the first half-hour or so of the film, I kept thinking it would've been more entertaining if the stars had switched roles. Indeed Gould confirms that they got to the set and told the director and producer on Day 1 that they wanted to switch roles, but their request was denied. The production proceeded to be plagued by budget restrictions,  the death of a supporting actor (!), and even studio interference w/ the film's title (!!!), which was originally "WET STUFF"... admittedly a terrible title... which the filmmakers eventually changed to SPIES and then, at the request of 20th Centiury Fox, changed again to SPYS, which is not a word in the English language but is how the title appears in the opening credits. Fox then unilaterally inserted asterisks between the letters in all promo materials to make audiences think the film was a sequel to M*A*S*H, also starring Sutherland & Gould. 

In spite of the mostly inert screenplay, SPYS goes down much easier than, say, MY FELLOW AMERICANS, the incredibly puerile and irritating buddy action/comedy I watched a couple weeks ago. That's a credit to Gould and Sutherland, who seem to authentically enjoy clowning around together. It's also a credit to director Irvin Kershner, who keeps things moving crisply around and past a lot of clunky dialogue, and to Kershner's D.P. Gerry Fisher, who frames the action in many unusually thoughtful and artistic compositions and thereby somehow makes a lot of the scenarios much funnier than they would've been in flat/static wides and shot-reverse-shots. (Kershner also admits in an interview he hated Fisher's previous film for Sidney Lumet and almost didn't hire him to shoot this - a likely catastrophic error.)

SPYS delivers mild chuckles rather than hilarity. There's a cute dog that figures significantly in the plot and a murderous bodyguard who looks exactly like Sean Connery would look in the late 80s. There's also a three-vehicle car chase through rural France that seems quaint by modern car chase standards, 'cause they're only going maybe 50-60 MPH along narrow pastoral roads and only occasionally passing noncombatant motorists. Because it's a car chase that's almost realistic, I could almost relate to it plausibly and have a better time with it than I could have watching the chase scene in THE BATMAN or one from a Michael Bay movie or something. SPYS is the kind of film that people tend to call "likable". It's obvious when the stars have ditched the dialogue and are improvising, and it's not the forced improv of the recent JACKPOT, for instance, it's just two fun actors getting to the point of the scene w/ minimal fussiness and a high level of natural coolness. Apparently they even replaced the entire final two pages of dialogue w/ the brisk final shot we get at the end - and  to that.

3.5/5
SPYS was considered a flop but Kershner somehow went on to direct STAR WARS V: EMPIRE (which of course is very good), NEVER SAY NEVER AGAIN (which is my favorite James Bond flick), and ROBOCOP 2, which I abhor profoundly. None of those titles seem like logical progressions from SPYS yet c'est la vie!

[Rev. Powell]

MST3K: TRACK OF THE MOONBEAST: One of a very few episodes I had yet to see (I'm down to one or two left). This one involves a geology student who gets grazed by a moon meteorite and turns into a ravening Moon Beast; his pal Johnny Longbow (or Longbone) makes stew and tries to save him with the help of his girlfriend, who favors pink hot pants. In Castle Forrestor, Pearl has exposed Bobo's brain and is controlling it with a universal remote control. Solid episode that sparked MSTies favorite stew recipe (chicken, corn, green peppers, chilies, and ..sigh.. onions...) 4/5.

[Dr. Whom]

Tokyo Sonata (2008)

A middle-aged Tokyo salaryman is made redundant by his company. He hides this from his family in a desperate attempt to keep his status as the patriach.

I don't know about this. In the first hour, you just have stuff happening, with the family structure slowly disintegrating. But it is more a series of 'and thens' and few 'therefores', which doesn't make for an interesting story. Suddenly you have various crises, and then (there it is again) everybody decides to carry on and come to a conciliation.
It is an indictment of patriarchal structures, especially in Japanese society, but it failed to retain my attention. There is no real buildup to the crisis, and when it comes, it is curiously without consequences. 

[M.10rda]

It's Kiyoshi Kurosawa, right? That sounds about like him. "Characters failing to respond appropriately to catastrophic crisis" would be on the Kurosawa bingo sheet. I remember this one being released and think I missed it, but it's possible I saw it and have forgotten all specifics other than Koji Yakusho (who's in most Kurosawas). After BRIGHT FUTURE and DOPPELGANGER I started tuning Kurosawa out a little...

[Dr. Whom]

Yep, it is Kiyoshi Kurasawa alright. I can live with happy endings that are tacked on so as not to depress the audience too much. But here everything falls apart, and nothing happens. 

[lester1/2jr]

Godzilla (1954) - I'd never seen this before. The precedent is, I guess, King Kong but the tone (dark) and themes (anti war) are very different. Obviously Hiroshima and Nagasaki were not subtle influences: they are mentioned in some form or other about every 15 minutes. Outside of the obvious issue of a giant monster attacking a country, the sub plot is about a scientist being apprehensive about helping in part because of how his extremely powerful, Godzilla fighting invention might be used by evil people.

4.75 /5 I don't know if a more substantive Godzilla movie is what I was personally looking for, but it's very impressive in terms of both special effects and story-wise.

[FatFreddysCat]

"2019: After the Fall of New York" (1983)
20 years after a nuclear holocaust, most of humanity is sterile due to radiation poisoning. A soldier of fortune (Michael Sopkiw) is sent into the crumbling ruins of New York City to rescue the last remaining fertile woman from an evil corporation that plans to "harvest" her to re-populate the planet. Cue lots of running and fist fighting in burnt-down buildings and sewer tunnels.
An absolutely shameless Italian rip off of "Escape From New York" with a healthy dose of "Mad Max" for flavor. The acting sucks, the sets are cheap, the plot goes in circles, and the dialogue is gibberish. Fun if you're a fan of cheap post-apoc schlock, utterly useless to anyone else.
AVOID.

[M.10rda]

Godzilla (1954) - Outside of the obvious issue of a giant monster attacking a country, the sub plot is about a scientist being apprehensive about helping in part because of how his extremely powerful, Godzilla fighting invention might be used by evil people.

This is a great observation and you're completely right, of course. I haven't watched this in years but I always assumed Gojira was a by-product of the atomic bomb in Hiroshima and Nagasaki or was even symbolic of the atomic bomb. But after watching OPPENHEIMER earlier this year and remembering how much of the first GODZILLA is hand-wringing and debate over whether to use the oxygen-vaporizing Gojira-destroyer, yeah, it seems kind of impossible to not see that direct parallel and question whether Gojira is actually just supposed to represent........ rampant unchecked endless conflict and destruction or something?!

[M.10rda]

THE HOUSEMAID (1960):
What the heck was in the global film production water supply in 1960?! This highly regarded Korean thriller deserves a place alongside PSYCHO and PEEPING TOM as bold, revolutionary (if imperfect) creations that effectively transformed a mostly childish and pedestrian genre into something much closer to what we know today as modern Horror. We've all seen jilted mistress melodramas so if I tell you that a young woman takes a job as the housekeeper for hunky dad, chilly mom, and their two kids, you could imagine a lot of the major plot beats. In the case of this film, you'd be right - except you don't get those beats when or how you expect them, and you get a whooole lot more plot convolution, surprise twists, and pitch black mental illness into the equation.

It's important to mention that THE HOUSEMAID ain't Realism - it's a weird movie. Handsome yet frankly dopey Dad works as a music teacher or in-house entertainment for teen girls who slave away in what looks like a German Expressionist factory but are permitted a brief break each day to listen to him play the piano. (?!) Not one or even two but three of them of course fall for his semi-conscious charms. Each night he goes home to his new family home, which initially is filled with enormous piles of debris like it just survived the bombing of Dresden or something. Even after he and the wife and kids tidy up, the entire interior looks like a single-family duplex unit in the apartment building where Henry Spencer lives. (No s**t, there's even a weird pyramid-like pile of dirt on the nightstand in the master bedroom...!) Actors often behave like they reside in the ERASERHEAD universe, too (and actually this film's got some strong thematic parallels to that film...). Sometimes characters act completely irrationally and bizarre and someone will react appropriately; generally characters act completely irrationally and bizarre and no one will react as if anything is out of the ordinary; and then on occasion everyone flies into hysterical theatrics. The film's climax is pitched at a sustained level that reaches the marvelous excesses of Andrzej Zulawski. Srsly.

I don't invoke two of my favorite filmmakers lightly, but I'm also not completely sold on THE HOUSEMAID. It opens with a prologue and credits sequence (really just one shot) that struck me at first as mindbogglingly brilliant, and maybe it is. But ultimately that opening sets up a twist ending coda that seems like a cop-out as well as being utterly tonally bizarre. Then again, everything else about THE HOUSEMAID is pretty bizarre, so maybe I shouldn't get peeved about yet one more outrageous flourish in the final moments.

3.5/5
Unquestionably worth watching, as long as you like weird movies and you don't have an expectant mother or a newborn in the house.

[FatFreddysCat]

"Romi" (2023)
A troubled young woman hides from her responsibilities by taking a gig house sitting at a high tech "smart house" controlled by "Romi," a kindly-sounding, but possibly sinister, A.I. As weird stuff starts happening around her, our heroine wonders if it's all in her mind, or if the house is really out to get her.
This Tubi original was better than expected. It's got a great performance by the young leading lady, a couple of unexpected twists, and a nice mix of sci-fi and supernatural horror. Worth checking out.

[Rev. Powell]

WAITING FOR DALI (2023): A restaurateur in Salvador Dali's hometown of Cadaqués in the 70s dreams of luring the artist to visit his Dali-themed "El Surreal" bistro, and catches a break when a master chef on the lam shows up. A breezy, pleasant, not especially surreal light drama that's like a holiday by the seashore. 3/5.

[FatFreddysCat]

"The Twisters" (2024)
A bickering brother-and-sister pair of meteorologists must figure out how to stop a massive cluster of tornadoes from merging into a gigantic Mega-Nado with the potential to wipe out the entire Midwest and kill millions of people.
In case the title didn't give it away, this is The Asylum's cheese-and-crackers knock-off of this year's big summer blockbuster, "Twisters" (notice the "The" in the title, kids -- totally different movie!). As usual, it's full of gibberish pseudo-scientific dialogue, Z-list stunt casting ('80s pop tart Tiffany slums it for a quick paycheck as a buttoned-down military scientist) and cheap CGI effects (which are sweetened with actual stock footage of real storms and their resulting damage). This one's about average for the Asylum; your mileage may vary depending on your tolerance for their brand of schlock. They've done better, but they've also done far worse.

[M.10rda]

It would be sweet if Tiffany sang all her dialogue to the tune of her lone hit single:

Are we chasing a tor-NAAAAA0-do
Or is this twister
Just a hurricane?