(From 1974’s The Parallax View)
Daily Archives: July 25, 2016
Let’s Talk About Atomic Shark!
In case you missed it, it is currently Shark Week on the SyFy network. (Or, as theSnarkalecs and I like to call it, Snark Week!) Sharknado 4 will be premiering on Sunday and, in honor of that historic event, SyFy has devoted this week to broadcasting some of their trademark original movies. Along with showing such classics as Jersey Shore Shark Attack and Zombie Shark, SyFy is also premiering several new shark films.
The first of those films premiered last night. And its name was ….
ATOMIC SHARK!!!!
Seriously, that’s a great name! In a few of my Lifetime reviews, I’ve pointed out that there is an art to picking the perfect title for a Lifetime film. Well, the same is true for a SyFy film. A title like Atomic Shark tells the audience everything that they need to know. On the simplest level, it lets the viewers know that the film is about a shark and that the shark is, in some way, atomic. But even beyond that, a title like Atomic Shark announces, “This is going to be a fun movie! Sit back, relax, and don’t worry too much about the specifics. Just enjoy yourself.”
As I watched the movie last night, I saw a few people on twitter worrying about things like whether or not a shark could actually become atomic or whether the characters were acting like logical human beings. Those people were missing the entire point of the film. Seriously, you have to be the world’s biggest douchebag to actually nitpick a film that has a title like Atomic Shark.
The film takes place on the San Diego shoreline. At first, it seems like a normal (if rather overcast) day at the beach. Men in speedos. Women in bikinis. Lifeguards on duty. Jeff Fahey steering a motor boat and barely noticing when a water skier is suddenly devoured by a glowing shark. A kid pretending to drown, just so he can get some mouth-to-mouth.
And then there’s the drones. There are drones flying up and down this beach. The majority of them are lifeguard drones, which are used to deliver life vests to people drowning out in the middle of the ocean. However, there are also a few drones being controlled by pervy little Fletcher (David Faustino), who films unsuspecting swimmers and joggers and then uploads the video to his site. Even when confronted by an indignant lifeguard, Fletcher responds, “The beach is public domain!”
Well, the beach may be public domain but it’s about the become … atomic domain!
That’s right, there’s a glowing shark out there and it’s hungry! Not only is it eating people but, because it’s radioactive, it’s setting them on fire too! In fact, this shark is so radioactive that it’s causing sea food to become explosive. When the local restaurant blows up, the authorities blame it on a gas leak but we know it was because of the radioactive plankton.
(The film also lets us know that the restaurant had four stars on Yelp before the explosion and only three stars after.)
Unfortunately, only one person truly believes in the existence of atomic shark. Gina (Rachele Brooke Smith) is the greatest lifeguard who ever lived but, unfortunately, her superior, Reese (Adam Ambruso), is a dumbass jerk who doesn’t understand that workplace sexual harassment is no longer acceptable. Since Gina can’t get any support from the authorities, she gathers together her own group of shark hunters and, before you cay say, “We’re going to need a bigger boat,” they set out to destroy the atomic shark!
One of those shark hunters is the boat captain played by Jeff Fahey and I have to say that I was so happy when I realized that Fahey was in this movie. Jeff Fahey is one of those immensely likable actors who can make almost any line of dialogue memorable. Playing the Quint role here, Fahey is a lot of fun. Also deserving a lot of credit is Rachele Brooke Smith, who kicks so much ass as the no-nonsense Gina that I found myself thinking that, in case Gal Gadot demands too much money to reprise her role, Smith could easily take over her role in any future Wonder Woman films.
As the film’s screenwriter, Griff Furst, pointed out on twitter, Atomic Shark is a comedy. Taking it seriously is definitely the biggest mistake that a viewer could make. This is a movie that was meant to be watched with a group of your loudest and snarkiest friends. It’s a lot of fun.
(That said, just because it’s comedy, that doesn’t mean that anyone’s safe. This is the rare shark film where you’re actually shocked when a few characters fail to escape the nuclear menace of atomic shark.)
Atomic Shark is a lot of fun and it was a great way to start Shark Snark Week on SyFy!
Artist Profile: The Brandon House Covers of Fred Fixler
Brandon House (not to be confused with Random House) published pulp paperbacks from 1937 to 2007, with its most popular work coming out in the late 1960s. Though he is best remembered for the advertising work that he did for companies like Coca-Cola and Continental Airlines, illustrator Fred Fixler was also responsible for some of the best remembered paperback covers to come out of Brandon House. Though Fixler (who died in 2010) declined most offers to be interviewed about his time at Brandon House, it seems that most of his covers were done between 1964 and 1966.
A small sampling can be found below and if you want to learn more about Fred Fixler and his non-pulp work, check out this page that was created by some of his former students.
If some of the covers below seem racy, you should see the ones that I didn’t share!
4 Shots From 4 Films (*Sigh*): Every Young Woman’s Battle (2014), The Creation Adventure Team: Six Short Days, One Big Adventure (2002), Let Me Die A Woman (1977), If Footmen Tire You What Will Horses Do? (1971)
There are so many movies/videos that I am sitting on. Some I have seen, and some I only know because I have seen a review of them, but I do have a copy of them. I thought I would share four of the real crazy ones. If nothing else, just in case I never get to them.
Every Young Woman’s Battle (2014)
I actually have a partial review of this written. It’s been sitting in the drafts section since April. The reason is that there is just so much crazy that the review is going to be really long. The video is a speech given by Shannon Ethridge to a small room of middle-aged Asian women and one guy basically telling them that your husband is not the one who is going to satisfy your “emotional needs.” That’s what Jesus is for in a marriage. So, it’s kind of like War Room (2015), but a whole lot crazier.
How crazy? First, she opens up the lecture by telling us she is passionate about sexual purity because she has AIDS. Visual AIDS! Then she shows pictures of her family. She goes on to tell us about the time she came to her husband and told him he wasn’t satisfying her “emotional needs.” I put them in quotes because she will make it clear she means sexual needs along with the emotional component. So, how does her husband respond to this? He says he could line up all the men in Dallas outside her door, but it wouldn’t be enough for her. That’s right. He offered to arrange a Debbie Does Dallas (1978) gang bang for her. That’s just one example of the crazy, and how this is really sad for Ethridge at the same time.
The Creation Adventure Team: Six Short Days, One Big Adventure (2002, dir. Cathy Henderson)
An apple on the end of an arrow gets shot into the nose of a dinosaur in the Garden of Eden. Do I need to say more? This is a video that was meant to teach creationism to kids, but actually winds up making everyone alive ashamed to be part of the human race regardless of what they believe. Oh, and it has a sequel where they explain the whole dinosaur situation in creationism.
Let Me Die A Woman (1977, dir. Doris Wishman)
In the transploitation mondo “documentary” Let Me Die A Woman (1977) they felt it was necessary that we see what happens when you have sex too soon after having bottom surgery. It’s very important that we see it, and can’t just be told. How else do you do this scene, but to have the trans woman have sex with a cab driver played by no less then Deep Throat (1972) pornographic superstar Harry Rheems. He says, “Thanks, lady,” which is immediately followed by her noticing blood on the sheets in between her legs before quickly grabbing the phone. It then cuts back to Rheems who seems happy about the situation before leaving the room. That shot above is from when he tells her “thanks”. We learn from the “doctor” of this movie right afterwards that what she had was “sex impatience”. Apparently, sometimes you just have to have Harry Rheems’ dick in you.
That’s not all this movie shows either. We have the graphic bottom surgery scenes, the dick chopping off scene, the maintaining your new vagina with a dildo-like object scene, and more!
If Footmen Tire You What Will Horses Do? (1971, dir. Ron Ormond)
This is one I have only seen a review of, but I do have a copy of it. The film is basically a cross between a Christian and Communist scare film. This is from the end of the Communist part of the movie. At the end, there is just a little kid left. He won’t give up his belief in Jesus, so the Communist solider pulls out a machete, chops off his head, and throws it off into a field. That’s it right there. This from a director who survived a plane crash and decided to stop making exploitation films to make Christian scare films instead. As Brad Jones (The Cinema Snob) said: “He never really stopped making exploitation films. He just made sure to mention Jesus in all of the them.”
What’s great is that the first film and the last one here actually have a connection to each other. In If Footmen Tire You What Will Horses Do? (1971) there is a scene where Communists are apparently going to teach boys about the seven erotic zones of passion in every woman. Of course they cut away from that because that situation doesn’t exist. In Every Young Woman’s Battle, Ethridge says the devil perverted sexuality seven different ways or seven different times in the Bible. That’s where that 1970’s Christian scare film got that from.
Artwork of the Day: The Other Side of the Night
Artist Unknown
Music Video of the Day: Rosanna by Toto (1982, dir. Steve Barron)
Unless Lisa has changed her mind (very possible), she is currently posting dance scenes that she loves this week. I like coordinating a theme around a week or a month like we do here sometimes at Through The Shattered Lens. That’s why I am going to post six videos this week that feature dancing. I am starting with Toto’s Rosanna.
As you may have noticed, this is another one of these done by director Steve Barron. So far we have seen him direct music videos for The Human League in 1983 and a-ha in 1985. In 1982 he took Toto, who is probably best known for songs like Africa and Hold The Line, and brought us this mixture of Cynthia Rhodes doing her thing, West Side Story (1961), and Toto looking like they are on a darker looking version of the set that Stray Cats used in Stray Cat Strut.
The music video is similar to Whitesnake’s 1987 version of Here I Go Again. By that I mean they filmed some of Toto’s performance, but it’s really Cynthia Rhodes who shines as the West Side Story lady dancing in a red dress. My favorite part is at about the three minute mark of the video when it goes into pure instrumental and she lifts her leg up completely straight into the air against the chain link fence. Another nice moment is around the two minute mark when we are looking at a closeup shot of the lead singer’s face. In one shot of his face, we can see Rhodes dancing in the background, and the other time see the gang members walking towards him.
It also happens to be a great song by a group that certainly doesn’t get the same love as their songs such as Africa and Hold The Line. You can probably still talk to teenagers today who will not know the name of the group or the title of the song, but they will remember hearing that song about “I blessed the rains down in Africa” or “I touched the rains down in Africa” they heard on the radio at some point.
One final thing is that you might not know Cynthia Rhodes. She played Penny Johnson in Dirty Dancing (1987). She was also in the critical failure of a sequel to Saturday Night Fever (1977) called Staying Alive (1983). In other words, I think it’s safe to say that being in Runaway (1984) was the real reason she ultimately wound up giving up her career to be a full-time mother as IMDb says she did. She would also show up in at least two other videos done by her then husband Richard Marx. That, and she is a well-known dancer of the period in general.
This is also one of those music videos where we know more than just the director. Paul Flattery produced this music video. We will see him again and again.
It’s an excellent music video for an excellent song, and I hope you enjoy it.
Through the Shattered Lens 