Recent Viewings, Part 2

[Rev. Powell]

RIFFTRAX LIVE: TIME CHASERS: You know the movie: some guys in Vermont decide to make a time-travel movie with no budget or actors, produce something that's watchable but far from good. I'm not a big fan of "re-riffs" of old MST3K episodes but fans seem to love them, and I watch them for completeness' sake. No surprise that they sued up their best riffs decades ago, but I laughed a couple of times. There's also a new short that's forgettable despite starring a chimp, and some scenes that were cut out in the MST3K version with an overacting New York cabbie (who actually gives them a lot of material). 3/5.

[M.10rda]

ANDROCLES AND THE LION (1952):
This supposed George Bernard Shaw adaptation has two of my favorite things: Elsa Lanchester and a big kitty cat. Unfortunately Elsa runs terrified from the film during the first 15 minutes but the kitty cat comes back for the final act. In the meanwhile we're stuck w/ the generally irritating Alan Young (fifth-billed, so the producers must not have loved him either!) who plays Androcles as an only slightly more self-aware version of Peter Sellars' "Chauncey" from BEING THERE. He's swept up in a Roman centurion ICE-like sweep, of Christians instead of immigrants or dissidents, and then paraded (slowly) to the Circus Maximus. (Holy Foreshadowing!)

I am familiar w/ Aesop's fable (as you may be) though have never read nor seen the play by Shaw... though I have read and seen a lot of other Shaw. Although this movie puts Shaw's name and likeness (in marble!) front and center, I could only identify about 2/3rds of the screenplay as reasonably Shavian - the other third (including most of Androcles' dialogue) is pure bad mid-century sitcom shtick.  The sitcom-y sensation is emphasized when Jim Backus (Thornton Howell/Mr. Magoo) shows up as a testy Roman Centurion.  The arrested Christians all behave as Borg-like unimind pollyannas for more than half the film, before the screenwriters finally allow some of them to crack and admit that maybe dying for the glory of Christ and the pleasure of Emperor Caligula isn't such a fun idea after all, at which point the film becomes a bit more interesting.

Jean Simmons was no Elsa Lanchester (in my very unusual book only) but she was a supernaturally lovely lady, and she gets to give a much better performance as the defacto spokesperson for the doomed Christians than she was permitted to give in/as DESIREE. The second most-consequential Christian is played by Robert Newton, a large distinctive actor who did a couple films w/ Mr. Lanchester (Charles Laughton) and then probably played several roles that Laughton rejected, at least until the advent of Peter Ustinov. Here he plays a wild-eyed Zealot who is so compelling he could've probably been the protagonist, though the fact he's used as seasoning rather than as the main ingredient is still much to the film's benefit. At the climax of this largely cheeky trifle, Newton's rage gets the better of his Christian charity and he's allowed to slay multiple homicidal gladiators, onscreen.  This is very much to the favor of ANDROCLES AND THE LION, I must admit. However, [SPOILER] then he and Simmons and most of the rest of the Christians are bizarrely spared thru Caligula Ex Machina, which does kind of defeat much of the point the martyrs have been struggling to make. [END NON-TRADITIONAL SPOILER] And also of course, like in the fable, Androcles and the Lion are reunited, and (a bit unfortunately) Alan Young survives the film undevoured.[END TRADITIONAL SPOILER]

3/5    This was one I wanted to slip into the "Historical Movies In Order" list but I missed my shot. The most peculiar trivia about ANDROCLES AND THE LION is that, while the lion is mostly played by a real lion  in 2 or 3 wide shots he is played by....... Woody Strode!  Ah well, Strode's gotta' work!   

[Dr. Whom]

It has been ages since I read Androcles and the Lion, the play, but I remember it as being very much on the nose.

[Rev. Powell]

DECORADO (2025): A cartoon mouse in a world of beer-guzzling ghosts, lute-playing demons, and reverse mermaids, ruled over by an omnipotent megacorporation, begins to believe that his reality is staged. Alberto Vázquez's derealized black comedy is anti-capitalist, anti-conformist, and bleakly existential--depressing, but thoughtful. 3.5/5.