Rest In Peace, Chuck Norris

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Rest in Peace, Chuck Norris.

I honestly never thought I’d write those words.  Chuck Norris has passed away at the age of 86.  Chuck inspired generation of martial artists.  He won the respect of Bruce Lee.  He choreographed some of the best fight scenes of the early 70s.  He never claimed to be a great actor but he still starred in some of the most entertaining films ever made.  He is survived by five children and 13 grandchildren.  By all accounts, he was a genuinely good guy who took his position as a role model seriously.  He will be missed.  It’s hard to know what else to say right now so I’ll let Chuck do the talking:

Scenes I Love: The Baffling Ending of Jungle Fever

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Today is Spike Lee’s birthday so today’s scene that I love is the rather random ending of Lee’s 1991 film, Jungle Fever.  I’ve seen this referred to as being the best worst ending of a movie and I don’t now if I’d go quite that far but it’s definitely in contention.

4 Shots From 4 Films: Special Hollywood Edition

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

4 Or More Shots From 4 Or More Films is just what it says it is, 4 shots from 4 of our favorite films. As opposed to the reviews and recaps that we usually post, 4 Shots From 4 Films lets the visuals do the talking!

Today, we pay tribute to Hollywood with 4 shots from 4 films!

4 Shots From 4 Films About Hollywood

Beyond The Valley Of The Dolls (1970, dir by Russ Meyer, DP: Fred J. Koenekamp)

Hollywood Boulevard (1976, dir by Allan Arkush and Joe Dante, DP: Jamie Anderson)

Mulholland Drive (2001, dir by David Lynch, DP: Peter Deming)

Once Upon A Time In Hollywood (2019, dir by Quentin Tarantino, DP: Robert Richardson)

Live Tweet Alert: Join #FridayNightFlix for Fear City!

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

As some of our regular readers undoubtedly know, I am involved in a few weekly watch parties.  On Twitter, I host #FridayNightFlix every Friday and I co-host #ScarySocial on Saturday.  On Mastodon, I am one of the five hosts of #MondayActionMovie!  Every week, we get together.  We watch a movie.  We tweet our way through it.

Tonight, at 10 pm et, I will be hosting #FridayNightFlix!  The movie?  1984’s Fear City!

If you want to join us this Friday, just hop onto twitter, find Fear City on Prime or Tubi, start the movie at 10 pm et, and use the #FridayNightFlix hashtag!  I’ll be there happily tweeting.  It’s a friendly group and welcoming of newcomers so don’t be shy.

See you there!

 

Music Video of the Day: Lemon Pound Cake by Afroman (2022, dir by ????)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

In 2022, sheriff’s deputies in Adams County, Ohio raided the home of rapper Afroman.  According to the warrant, they were doing so on suspicion of drug trafficking and kidnapping.  They found neither drugs nor kidnapping victims but they did find and seize over $5,000 worth of Afroman’s money.  The money was later returned, with $400 of it missing.  During the raid, they also damaged the front gate, blew up a door, and illegally turned off the house’s security cameras.

Afroman responded with several songs and videos about the raid, all utilizing the footage that security cameras recorded before being shut down.  The deputies attempted to sue, claiming that the videos were an invasion of their privacy.  The judge eventually threw out their lawsuit though another lawsuit, claiming that the video and the songs “defamed” the deputies was allowed to proceed.  Yesterday, Afroman also won that court case.

So, I guess that means that we can  now safely share Lemon Pound Cake.

Enjoy!

Beavis and Butt-Head Do America (1996, directed by Mike Judge)

Posted on by Jedadiah Leland

While having a dream about being a giant who can destroy a city and almost score, Butt-Head is woken up by his friend Beavis.  Beavis points out that their TV has disappeared. Muddy footprints lead away from the television’s former location and out the front door.  Anyone who is familiar with MTV’s Beavis and Butt-Head will immediately realize that this is a crisis.  Animated and voiced by Mike Judge, the moronic teenage duo of Beavis and Butt-Head really don’t have anything in their lives beyond television and heavy metal.  Beavis and Butt-Head set off to find their television, a quest that will see them traveling all the way from Highland, Texas to Las Vegas and eventually Washington D.C.  Along the way, they’ll be pursued by ATF Agent Fleming (Robert Stack), they’ll get hired by alcoholic Muddy Grimes (Bruce Willis) to kill his wife, Dallas (Demi Moore), and Dallas will set them up as the perfect patsies for a terrorist attack on Washington D.C.  Chelsea Clinton will beat up Butt-Head.  President Clinton will declares the boys to be heroes.  They’ll even meet their fathers, though everyone involved will be too dumb to realize it.  But will Beavis and Butt-Head ever find their TV?

Beavis and Butt-Head Do America was the first movie to star Beavis and Butt-Head and I can still remember when it first came out in 1996.  No one expected much from it but it turned out to be one of the funniest movies of the year, a triumph of animation, social satire, and jokes about wood.  A lot of the film’s humor comes from just how stupid Beavis and Butt-Head are but even more of the humor comes from everyone’s inability to understand just how stupid they are.  Agent Fleming may think he’s saving America but he’s actually just chasing two teenagers who don’t even know how to read their own names.  Muddy may think that he’s hired two experienced hitmen to “do” his wife but instead, he’s promised to pay two idiots to do his wife.  (With the money, “we could buy a TV,” Butt-Head tells Beavis.)  Everyone, from Fleming to Muddy Grimes, assumes that there must be some sort of grand scheme behind Beavis and Butt-Head’s journey across America.  There isn’t.  They just want to find a television.

Beavis and Butt-Head were and still are two wonderfully comedic creations.  Watching them, I’m always surprised to remember that Mike Judge provided both of their voices.  When they argue with each other about where their TV has gone or if it’s a good idea to jump out of a speeding car, Judge is arguing with himself.  Butt-Head may be the leader but the heart of the duo is definitely Beavis and maybe Cornholio.  The non-stop laughing, the inability to read, the obsessively crude humor, Beavis and Butt-Head were the future and they didn’t even realize it.  Voicing the boys and their neighbor Mr. Anderson, Mike Judge generates most of the laughs in the movie but he still gets first-class help from Bruce Willis, Demi Moore, and especially Robert Stack.

Beavis and Butt-Head Do America was considered to be a surprise commercial and critical success but the only people who were really surprised were those who hadn’t previously experienced Mike Judge’s sense of humor and satirical viewpoint.  Beavis and Butt-Head Do America is smart comedy about some very dumb people.

Blind Date (1987, directed by Blake Edwards)

Posted on by Jedadiah Leland

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Walter Davis (Bruce Willis) is a workaholic who, in typical 80s fashion, is trying to secure a deal to manage the assets of a Japanese industrialist.  When he needs a date to a business dinner, his brother (Phil Hartman) sets him up with his wife’s cousin, Nadia (Kim Basinger).  Walter is warned to not let Nadia take a single sip of alcohol.  Of course, Walter lets Nadia drink some champagne.  It turns out that Nadia loses all of her inhibitions when she drinks and she says exactly what’s on her mind.  The dinner turns into a disaster as Nadia convinces the industrialist’s wife to file for divorce.  Walter not only loses his job but he now has to get the intoxicated Nadia back home.  Making that difficult is that Nadia’s ex, David (John Larroquette), is still obsessed with her.  David is also crazy and spends almost the entire night chasing Nadia and Walter.

Blind Date is historically significant because it was both Bruce Willis’s first credited film role (he had previously appeared, uncredited, in The First Deadly Sin and The Verdict) and also Willis’s first starring role.  Willis received the role after becoming a sudden star due to his role on Moonlighting and the entire movie is full of television actors.  John Larroquette was best-known for Night Court.  Phil Hartman had just started on Saturday Night Live.  William Daniels appears as Larroquette’s father.  At the time Blind Date came out, Kim Basinger was the closest thing that the cast had to a legitimate movie star.

Watching Blind Date today, it’s strange to see Willis playing a nebbish.  He’s likable but miscast as a straight-laced executive who needs his sister-in-law to set him up on a date.  It’s a role that would have been best-served by someone like John Ritter, who starred in director Blake Edwards’s Skin Deep just two years after Blind Date.  As David, John Larroquette is cartoonish but entertaining and he gets most of the best lines.  Kim Basinger is beautiful as Nadia but doesn’t always seem to be comfortable performing comedy.  There are funny moments but, as with so many of Blake Edwards’s later films, it’s uneven.

Blind Date was a box office hit.  (It was the last big hit of Blake Edwards’s career.)  The film found its real success on HBO, where it was a mainstay for several years.  Luckily, a more appropriate starring vehicle for Bruce Willis was released just a year later.  In Die Hard, Bruce Willis brought John McClaine to life and made film history.

I Watched The Whole Nine Yards (2000, Dir. by Jonathan Lynn)

Posted on by Dazzling Erin

Oz (Matthew Perry) is an unhappily married dentist who discovers that his new neighbor, Jimmy (Bruce Willis), is a notorious contract killer who has a bounty on his head.  Oz’s wife, Sophie (Rosanna Arquette), wants Oz to rat Jimmy out to the local mob boss (Kevin Pollack) and collect the bounty.  Oz is deeply in debt and has a hard time saying no to his wife but he and Jimmy have actually become friends.  Also, Oz is falling in love with his dental assistant, Jill (Amanda Peet) despite the fact that Jill is also a contract killer, though she’s still a “virgin” because she’s falling in love with the man that she was hired to kill.

The Whole Nine Yards is an amusing comedy that works because of the chemistry between Matthew Perry and Bruce Willis.  When it came to his movie career, Perry was always Chandler Bing no matter who he was playing but that didn’t matter because everyone loved Chandler.  I know I loved Chandler, even if Joey would have been the Friend that I probably would have ended up flirting with.  Perry was a naturally funny actor and he and Willis made for a good team in The Whole Nine Yards.  I also really liked Amanda Peet’s energetic performance as Jill and Kevin Pollack as the crime boss.  The Whole Nine Yards is basically a violent sitcom.  It may not be a great movie but Perry and Willis will make you laugh.

It’s a little hard to rewatch now.  Matthew Perry is gone.  Bruce Willis is retired for health reasons.  They’re both having so much fun in this movie and are so entertaining to watch that it’s impossible not feel a little sad watching them.  But the movie also shows what Perry and Willis could do, even with so-so material.  Watching the movie made me laugh and it made me sad but mostly it just made me appreciate their talent.  We can mourn what we’ve lost while still appreciating what we had.