Recent Viewings, Part 2

[M.10rda]

THE RED MILL (1927):
For some reason I imagined this was about a spooky old haunted mill but then no, it's a light and frothy romantic farce, but then yes, at the end the spooky haunted old red mill appears!    THE RED MILL is the first feature-length film I've seen directed by Roscoe Arbuckle, working under the name "William Goodrich" during his official/nominal exile from the Hollywood spotlight. There's probably a good reason he stuck to making shorts for so long - maintaining hilarity for 75 minutes is tough. THE RED MILL is really more a romance w/ sporadic goofy comedy.

Marion Davies plays "Tina", a little Dutch girl  slaving away in rural Holland under the thumb of a sadistic master. There's a whole elaborate plot involving the arranged (by mail) engagement of Tina's wealthy Irish ex-boyfriend to her master's comically fugly daughter, who (sight unseen) the ex-boyfriend thinks is Tina 'cause she lied to him and told him she was rich and blah blah blah, hijinks ensue. All of it is just an excuse for Davies to look and act cute, which she does quite well. In THE PATSY Davies reminded me of Kirsten Dunst; here she's a redhead and looks more like Gillian Anderson or Tea Leoni.  The screenplay (credited to a female author) is far more pedestrian than the usual Arbuckle mayhem, but it does seem like he had some influence on the intertitles, and he creates one opportunity early on for Davies to perform some solo physical comedy in the kitchen that is really impressive and reminds one of the kind of stuff Lucille Ball would get up to on her show in the 50s. Davies was a far more capable actress than her legacy (painted alas by Orson Welles in CITIZEN KANE) would suggest.

Then, in the last 15-20 minutes, Davies gets chased into the titular location, which is abandoned and reputedly haunted, though in fact it's just an OSHA nightmare. This sequence runs as long as many of Roscoe's shorts and was probably the reason he wanted to make THE RED MILL. It isn't peak Roscoe either but at least there's one climactic stunt that (in classic silent film tradition) looks appallingly unsafe.    3/5    Roscoe also has a brief and uncredited cameo as a bellhop. His head is shaved, kind of pointlessly as he's impossible to mistake onscreen, w/ or w/o hair.

[Jim H]

The Guyver - hadn't seen this since I was a teenager, rewatch in honor of Screaming Mad George's death.  It's...  Not good.  His creature work is great, but the film is thin.  Passably entertaining and not boring though. 

My favorite part is the bad guy's getting a little bit of side development that goes nowhere.  I wish there was more of that as they managed to be more interesting than the lead.

[Rev. Powell]

MOTHER OF FLIES (2026): A college girl and her father visit a witch in the woods searching for healing. Nice locations a few nifty practical effects, and a reasonably effective twist at the end, but it's mostly walking in the woods while reciting eldritch poetry. From the Adams family, a low-budget mother-father-daughter team (with some other family members in lesser roles) who've now made 4 or more horror films. Conceptually, I love the idea of the Adams family, but their movies have never really grabbed me; still, making average movies the way they make them is a triumph. 2.5/5.

[lester1/2jr]

The Howling (1981) - One of those big classics I just never got around to seeing. It kind of reminded me of Altered States in that it's from the early 80's but there is still a heavy whiff of 60's and 70's going on (and also that there are people transforming into hairy beasts). In this case, the wolfy people are "The Lottery" type small town weirdies with a touch of menacing swinger energy. A reporter with the worst luck on Earth first gets stalked by a porn loving serial killer, then, for a nice vacation, meets the above people and has to deal with all that. Director Joe Dante the did the Gremlins soon after this, so you can bet there are some creature-y special effects on the menu.

Great ending. Glad I finally saw this thing, but I'm not sure about the umpteen sequels.

4.5 / 5

[Rev. Powell]

lester: I think you can safely skip the sequels, although #2 does have a defender here.

[Trevor]

The Howling (1981) - One of those big classics I just never got around to seeing. It kind of reminded me of Altered States in that it's from the early 80's but there is still a heavy whiff of 60's and 70's going on (and also that there are people transforming into hairy beasts). In this case, the wolfy people are "The Lottery" type small town weirdies with a touch of menacing swinger energy. A reporter with the worst luck on Earth first gets stalked by a porn loving serial killer, then, for a nice vacation, meets the above people and has to deal with all that. Director Joe Dante the did the Gremlins soon after this, so you can bet there are some creature-y special effects on the menu.

Great ending. Glad I finally saw this thing, but I'm not sure about the umpteen sequels.

4.5 / 5

Lester, the fourth sequel HOWLING 4 THE ORIGINAL NIGHTMARE (1988) was filmed here on about a 5 and a half cent budget.

It is.......OK, no more than that. The best things about it are the werewolf melting sequence, the final shot of the film and the theme song sung by Justin Hayward of The Moody Blues. ☺️

It's on YouTube AFAIK. 😊🐢

[M.10rda]

I haven't watched the first HOWLING in 35 years or more. I thought Robert Picardo and the scene in the middle where he transforms were great and terrifying - but I was a little underwhelmed by the humorous bits. I should revisit it.

Same goes for all the sequels (adolescent watches). The VHS copy of PART II that I watched was so dark I couldn't make out heads or tails of it. It was a pre-record/rental from a store - is the film really that poorly lit and underexposed?

PART III is ridiculous, though seemingly intentionally.

I am glad to see Trevor offer guarded praise of PART 4, which... I liked as a kid! I was a very serious and unironic/insecure kid who thought I had a sense of humor yet hated humor in many places it turned up (such as in HOWLING 3) so in retrospect PART 4 might've benefitted from some humor, but - I enjoyed how straight and serious they played it. It's a more literal adaptation of the novel than Dante's original film, which I guess I also liked. The novel is, BTW, way r@piery than Dante's movie w/ no humor whatsoever. I don't recall any graphic sex abuse in PART 4 but the plot is closer to the novel.

PART 5... is kind of an unofficial remake of Amicus' awesome 70s werewolf mystery THE BEAST MUST DIE. I think PART 5 is terrific for about 25 minutes, then gradually makes every bad decision it can make to spiral into crappiness.

PART 6... never bothered.

No idea why all of the above is italicized.

[Trevor]

I haven't watched the first HOWLING in 35 years or more. I thought Robert Picardo and the scene in the middle where he transforms were great and terrifying - but I was a little underwhelmed by the humorous bits. I should revisit it.

Same goes for all the sequels (adolescent watches). The VHS copy of PART II that I watched was so dark I couldn't make out heads or tails of it. It was a pre-record/rental from a store - is the film really that poorly lit and underexposed?

PART III is ridiculous, though seemingly intentionally.

I am glad to see Trevor offer guarded praise of PART 4, which... I liked as a kid! I was a very serious and unironic/insecure kid who thought I had a sense of humor yet hated humor in many places it turned up (such as in HOWLING 3) so in retrospect PART 4 might've benefitted from some humor, but - I enjoyed how straight and serious they played it. It's a more literal adaptation of the novel than Dante's original film, which I guess I also liked. The novel is, BTW, way r@piery than Dante's movie w/ no humor whatsoever. I don't recall any graphic sex abuse in PART 4 but the plot is closer to the novel.

PART 5... is kind of an unofficial remake of Amicus' awesome 70s werewolf mystery THE BEAST MUST DIE. I think PART 5 is terrific for about 25 minutes, then gradually makes every bad decision it can make to spiral into crappiness.

PART 6... never bothered.

No idea why all of the above is italicized.

I am glad to see Trevor offer guarded praise of PART 4, which... I liked as a kid! I was a very serious and unironic/insecure kid who thought I had a sense of humor yet hated humor in many places it turned up (such as in HOWLING 3) so in retrospect PART 4 might've benefitted from some humor, but - I enjoyed how straight and serious they played it. It's a more literal adaptation of the novel than Dante's original film, which I guess I also liked. The novel is, BTW, way r@piery than Dante's movie w/ no humor whatsoever. I don't recall any graphic sex abuse in PART 4 but the plot is closer to the novel.

I viewed it on YouTube again and was amazed to see the amount of people I know and knew personally who worked on the film, including the guy who directed AMERICAN NINJA 3 BLOOD HUNT and AMERICAN NINJA 4 THE ANNILHLATION. 😳😳🐢

[M.10rda]

I don't think I knew it was shot in South Africa. Well - congratulations!   

[Trevor]

I don't think I knew it was shot in South Africa. Well - congratulations!   

☺️☺️

It was one of the many cut rate films made in South Africa during the controversial subsidy film scandal era. That almost killed our industry as many fly by night filmmakers took advantage of a loophole ridden film production assistance program and films like SPACE MUTINY and RETURN OF THE FAMILY MAN came out of it 😳😳

[M.10rda]

I've seen SPACE MUTINY. I assure you, SPACE MUTINY is an infinitely more valuable contribution to the international community of cinema than the films being pooped out in Buffalo, NY by Fred Olen Ray et cetera right now!

[Trevor]

I've seen SPACE MUTINY. I assure you, SPACE MUTINY is an infinitely more valuable contribution to the international community of cinema than the films being pooped out in Buffalo, NY by Fred Olen Ray et cetera right now!

My friend and mentor Vincent Cox ASC photographed SPACE MUTINY. That and THE DEMON 😳😉

[FatFreddysCat]

"Frank Miller: American Genius" (2024)

Biography of Frank Miller, the artist/writer who revived Daredevil, re-imagined Batman, and created the "300" and "Sin City" franchises over the course of a nearly 50 year career in comics and movies. A cool trip down memory lane, lloaded with interviews with friends, colleagues and fans, and plenty of nerd trivia. Worth checking out.

[lester1/2jr]

True Nature (2010) - What a conundrum this presents. One the one hand: The acting and dialogue are clearly b level. On top of that, the story itself is absurd. A woman goes jogging and gets kidnapped (or something?) then comes back with no memory of where she was. She isn't found, she shows up at her parent's house where she left a year before. She was somehow down the street and also somehow has no memory of where she was for a year and no one seems to be particularly curious about it.

And yet, there is the seed of an idea in there. It just badly needed some sort of sci fi or folk horror element to help make it work, and probably an entirely different setting, as well. This got terrible reviews on Letterboxd except one person gave it a 5/5. True Nature could work with a radical mega overhaul. It is, in most measurable ways, a real turkey, though.

3.99/5 but it was compelling for what the plot sort of could be!