Cleaning Out The DVR, Again #32: His Double Life (dir by Peter Sullivan)

Posted on July 11, 2016 by Lisa Marie Bowman

(Lisa is currently in the process of trying to clean out her DVR by watching and reviewing all 40 of the movies that she recorded from the start of March to the end of June. She’s trying to get it all done by the end of July 11th! Will she make it!? Keep visiting the site to find out!)

(MINOR SPOILERS)

The 32nd film on my DVR was His Double Life, which I recorded off of the Lifetime Movie Network on June 12th.

His Double Life has a plot that will be familiar to anyone who has ever watched a Lifetime film. Scarlett (Cristine Prosperi) is still recovering from the trauma of her father’s death in a traffic accident. It doesn’t help that, five years later, her mother, Linda (Emmanuelle Vaugier), has married her father’s former business partner, Greg (Brian Krause). Scarlett doesn’t trust Greg. Admittedly some of that is because she resents Greg trying to take the place of her father but, at the same time, there is definitely something off about Greg. He tries too hard. He never seems to be sincere when he’s being friendly. He practically oozes sleaze.

And yet, somehow, Scarlett seems to be the only person who has any suspicions about Greg. This is a common theme in Lifetime films. Even when someone is obviously up to no good, only one person ever seems to notice. Everyone else just makes excuses for Greg’s behavior. And you know what? That’s actually a lot more plausible than a lot of critics are willing to admit. No one ever wants to admit that their neighbor might be a serial killer.

Or a spy.

Anyway, Scarlett thinks that there’s something wrong with Greg. So, while visiting home from college, Scarlett decides to follow Greg around. She sees Greg with another woman and is convinced that she caught him cheating. However, the next day, the woman turns up dead!

Is Greg a murderer?

Or is he a spy?

You’ll have to watch the movie to find out!

(He’s both.)

His Double Life is an entertaining Lifetime film, with all that implies. However, there are two things that make this Lifetime film especially memorable.

First off, the film ends with a title card that informs us that, ever since the end of the Cold War, the number of Russian spies in the United States has actually increased. “They’re your neighbors. Your friends. YOUR HUSBANDS!” Seriously, it was so melodramatic and silly (and intentionally so, I like to believe) that I couldn’t help but love it.

Add to that, His Double Life continues the trend of former Degrassi cast members showing up in Lifetime movies. Cristine Prosperi is well-remembered for playing, over the course of three seasons, the endearingly quirky Imogen on Degrassi. Scarlett is a bit more conventional than Imogen but Prosperi still does a great job playing her. For that matter, Brian Krause also does a good job as the menacing Greg.

Enjoy His Double Life! Just remember that the person you watch it with could easily be a Russian spy…

Cleaning Out The DVR, Again #31: The Gay Divorcee (dir by Mark Sandrich)

Posted on July 11, 2016 by Lisa Marie Bowman

The 31st film on my DVR was the 1934 musical, The Gay Divorcee, which I recorded on June 7th when it aired on TCM.

The Gay Divorcee is a Fred Astaire/Ginger Rogers musical, which means that the plot is less important than the dancing, the singing, and the charm. The charm is especially important. Don’t get me wrong — The Gay Divorcee includes some wonderful music, including Night and Day and The Continental, which went on to be the first song to win an Oscar for Best Original Song. The dancing is incredible, as you would expect from any film featuring Astaire and Rogers.

But it’s the charm that makes The Gay Divorcee especially memorable. Full of sophisticated dialogue delivered by a cast of wonderful 1930s character actors, The Gay Divorcee offered up an escape to a country that was still reeling from the Great Depression. Some audiences went to a Warner Bros. gangster film and some audiences went to an Astaire/Rogers musical but what they all had in common was that the movies provided them a break from the harsh realities and hopelessness of everyday life.

As for the plot — well, it’s about rich people doing silly things. Mimi Glossop (Ginger Rogers) wants to get a divorce from her husband, a gynecologist named Cyril (William Austin). Apparently, Cyril doesn’t want to give her a divorce so Mimi, her aunt (Alice Brady), and her lawyer (Edward Everett Horton) come up with a plan that could only work in an Astaire/Rogers musical. Mimi will visit England and, while staying at a properly luxurious hotel, she will pretend to have an affair with Rodolfo Tonetti (Erik Rohodes), a professional gigolo.

However, upon arriving at the hotel, Mimi runs into Guy Holden (Fred Astaire). Guy is a friend of Rodolfo’s and he also happens to be in love with Mimi. Mimi, meanwhile, mistakes Guy for the gigolo and they proceed to dance the night away…

Listen, the plot doesn’t matter! What matters is that The Gay Divorcee features Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers at their best! This, after all, is the film that features Fred Astaire singing Cole Porter’s Night and Day…

And, of course, there’s The Continental…

The Gay Divorcee was one of the ten films nominated for best picture of 1934. However, it lost to an equally charming film of the 1930s, It Happened One Night.

The Gay Divorcee was a fun and needed escape for viewers in the 30s and you know what? We still need an escape today.

Artist Profile: Tom Dunn (1922 — 2004)

Posted on July 11, 2016 by Dazzling Erin

Tom Dunn was a prolific paperback cover illustrator but I couldn’t find much biographical information on him. I did learn that Dunn served with the Marines during World War II and became a commercial illustrator after returning home from the war.

Fortunately, Dunn’s work can speak for itself:

Music Video of the Day: Hurt by Johnny Cash (2003, dir. Mark Romanek)

Posted on July 11, 2016 by Valerie Troutman

This is another one where the song and video speak for themselves. A beautiful capstone on Johnny Cash’s career that breaks my heart when I hear it. It makes me want to cry when it is combined with the then relics of his life in the music video.

I remember driving to school many years ago and a DJ at our local San Francisco alternative rock station called Live 105 came on the air. He basically said this: “This is going to be kind of weird, but we don’t care. You have to hear what Johnny Cash did to this Nine Inch Nails song.” Then he played it. It was absolutely incredible to me. I don’t know what else to say.

One interesting thing of note outside of the song and the video itself is the director. You better believe we will see Mark Romanek again. He directed music videos like Lenny Kravitz’s Are You Gonna Go My Way and Criminal by Fiona Apple. Just to tie this all in together, he also directed both Closer and Perfect Drug for Nine Inch Nails. More recently, he directed Shake it Off for Taylor Swift. He has also done feature films such as One Hour Photo (2002) and Never Let Me Go (2010).

I figured it was appropriate to follow up Billy Joel’s We Didn’t Start The Fire with this song.

Artwork of the Day: Bold Men!

Posted on July 11, 2016 by Dazzling Erin

Artist Unknown

Cleaning Out The DVR, Again #30: The Inherited (dir by Devon Gummersall)

Posted on July 10, 2016 by Lisa Marie Bowman

The 30th film on my DVR was broadcast on the Lifetime Movie Network on June 5th. It was aired under the title The Inherited but, according to the imdb, it was originally called Stranger In The House. I imagine that Lifetime changed the title in order to keep viewers from confusing it with a previous Lifetime film that happened to have the same title.

Anyway, regardless of the title, this is a very confusing movie. That’s not necessarily a bad thing. This is just one of those films where, in order to truly understand what’s happening, you have to be willing to give the film some thought. It’s a film that raises many questions but doesn’t always supply easy answers. The answers are there but you have to be willing to look for them.

Unfortunately, because this film demands a certain amount of focus on the part of the audience, commercial television is probably the worst place for it to show up. When the action stops every fifteen minutes for a 3-minute block of commercials, it makes it a little bit difficult to remember what’s happened from one scene to another.

Stranger In The House/The Inherited tells the story of Eve (Jenn Liu) and Tom (Nathan Darrow). Eve and Tom has just gotten married. Eve lost her parents when she was younger and — well, to be honest, I’m not sure why the film opens with Eve’s parents dying. (Later, we find out that Tom’s parents also died when he was young. Maybe it’s all connected, maybe it isn’t. I honestly don’t know.) Tom is a widower. His first wife died but, in her will, she left Tom her family’s home on the condition that Tom never sell the house.

As soon as Tom and Eve move into the house, strange things start to happen. Eve thinks that she hears strange noises and she’s upset to discover that Tom has secrets that he hasn’t told her about. When his former sister-in-law, Wendy (Tammy Blanchard), comes over for dinner, she and Tom get into a huge argument that ends when Wendy’s necklace suddenly tightly wraps around her neck. Eve thinks there is something terrible in the house but Tom continually says that she’s imagining things. Fortunately, the housekeeper (Annabella Sciorra) believes Eve and even shares the fact that Tom cooked all of his first wife’s meals before she mysteriously fell ill and died. Suddenly, Tom’s cooking for Eve…

Soon, Eve doesn’t know who she can trust. Is the house haunted or is she going crazy? Is Tom trying to murder her or is Eve just going crazy? Is the housekeeper Eve’s friend or is Eve just going crazy? Could the film be any more of a Rebecca rip-off or is Eve just crazy? Is this film Gaslight or is it The Haunting?

I had to watch the ending a few times before I could tell you for sure. The Inherited is not always an easy film to follow. It’s directed in a deliberately dream-like manner, which leads to some memorably surreal scenes but which can also be frustrating when you’re trying to figure out what the Hell’s going on. Personally, I liked The Inherited because it had a lot of atmosphere, some good acting, and a lot of twists and turns. But it’s definitely not a film for everyone. You have to be willing to accept the fact that the movie is never going to make much sense.

On final note, Jenn Lui not only wrote this film but she also gave herself the lead role. That was a smart decision because the script is definitely written to her strengths as a performer. She gives a great performance, one that helps to hold this somewhat uneven film together.

Cleaning Out The DVR, Again #29: You May Now Kill The Bride (dir by Kohl Glass)

Posted on July 10, 2016 by Lisa Marie Bowman

(Lisa is currently in the process of trying to clean out her DVR by watching and reviewing all 40 of the movies that she recorded from the start of March to the end of June. She’s trying to get it all done by July 11th! Will she make it!? Keep visiting the site to find out!)

The 29th film on my DVR was You May Now Kill The Bride! You May Now Kill The Bride originally aired on Lifetime on June 4th, during which time I took part in one of the most epic live tweets ever. This was one of those films that brought out the best in everyone!

First off, You May Now Kill The Bride wins points for having one of the most brilliant titles of all time. Not only does it tell you exactly what the film is about (i.e., weddings and killings) but it sets the tone perfectly. When you see a title like You May Now Kill The Bride, you know that there’s no need to even try to take what you’re about to see seriously. You May Now Kill The Bride says “Sit back and have fun.”

You May Now Kill The Bride tells the story of Nicole (Ashley Newbrough), a 30-s0mething teacher who has yet to get married or have children. Almost everyone has given up on the idea of Nicole ever finding true love. And, really, that’s okay because Nicole has a fun-loving best friend named Celine (Aubrey Reynolds), who is always available to come over to the house and get drunk.

However, to everyone’s shock, Nicole meets and falls in love with the handsome and sensitive Mark (Rocky Myers). Mark asks Nicole to marry him and it’s really great because Mark is not only nice to look at but he owns a really nice house as well. He also has a stepsister named Audrey (Tammin Sursok) and here’s where things start to get a little bit complicated.

Y’see, Audrey isn’t quite sane. Not only is she obsessed with her stepbrother but she’s also interested in being Nicole’s best friend at well. Even though Celine immediately decides that Audrey is crazy, Nicole insists on making Audrey a bridesmaid.

Why not maid of honor?

Well, Celine already has that job. Or, at least, Celine has that job until she mysteriously ends up getting tossed over the ledge of a parking garage…

Now, it may sound like Audrey is really dangerous but actually, I think she was only trying to help out her new sister-in-law. During an earlier scene, Nicole announced that she was going to wear perhaps the least flattering wedding dress that I have ever seen in a Lifetime movie. Celine supported Ncole’s decision. Audrey, however, immediately started to plot to destroy the dress.

Sometimes, a bridesmaid just has to do what a bridesmaid has to do.

It is true that, plotwise, You May Now Kill The Bride may be a perfectly standard Lifetime story. But the cast throws themselves into their roles, the dialogue is full of snarkiness, and Tammin Sursok fully commits to playing obsessive Audrey. This is a film that lives up to the crazy promise of its name.

Cleaning Out The DVR, Again #28: The Turning Point (dir by Herbert Ross)

Posted on July 10, 2016 by Lisa Marie Bowman

(Lisa is currently in the process of trying to clean out her DVR by watching and reviewing all 40 of the movies that she recorded from the start of March to the end of June. She’s trying to get it all done by July 11th! Will she make it!? Keep visiting the site to find out!)

The 28th film on my DVR was the 1977 film The Turning Point. I recorded it off Indieplex on June 3rd.

I guess I should start this review by admitting that I really have no excuse. As someone who grew up dreaming of being a prima ballerina and who unknowingly caused her mother to spend an incalculable amount of money of dance classes, dance outfits, dance shoes, dance trips, and all the medical bills that go along with having a klutzy daughter who is obsessed with ballet and as someone who continues to love to dance today, I really have no excuse for not having seen The Turning Point before last night. Along with The Red Shoes and my beloved Black Swan, The Turning Point is one of three ballet movies to have been nominated for best picture. It’s a film that, as a result of its box office success, established many of the clichés that continue to show up in dance movies to this day.

Seriously, how had I not seen it before?

And make no mistake about it — The Turning Point is a dance movie. Don’t get me wrong. There’s a plot. Actually, there’s several plots and it’s not incorrect to describe The Turning Point as being something of a soap opera. But ultimately, all the plots are just window dressing. Director Herbert Ross started his career as a choreographer with the American Ballet Theater and the characters in The Turning Point are fictionalized portraits of people that he actually knew. Ross’s love for both ballet and the dancers comes through every frame of The Turning Point and the film’s best moments are when the melodrama takes a backseat to the performances onstage.

But I guess we actually should talk about the melodrama. Okay, here goes:

Many years ago, DeeDee (Shirley MacClaine) and Emma (Anne Bancroft) both belonged to the same New York ballet company. DeeDee was the star of the company and was set to play the lead in Anna Karenina when another dancer with the company, Wayne (Tom Skerritt), got her pregnant. DeeDee not only dropped out of the company but she married Wayne and moved back to his home state of Oklahoma. (The film suggests, in an oddly regressive moment, that Wayne only slept with DeeDee in order to prove that, despite being a male dancer, he wasn’t gay.) DeeDee and Wayne opened a dance studio in Oklahoma City while Emma got the lead in Anna Karenina and went on to become a prima ballerina.

18 years later, Wayne and DeeDee’s daughter, Emilia (Leslie Browne), is invited to join the company. Because Emilia is shy and somewhat naive, DeeDee accompanies her to New York while Wayne stays behind in Oklahoma with their younger children.

Once in New York, DeeDee starts to wonder if she made the right decision when gave up ballet for domesticity. She run into an old friend, conductor Joe Rosenberg (Anthony Zerbe, not playing a villain for once) and has an affair with him. Meanwhile, Emma is having an affair with a married man named Carter (Marshall Thompson) and is struggling to accept that she’s getting older and will soon have to retire. Just as DeeDee regrets giving up dancing, Emma regrets never having children.

Meanwhile, Emilia slowly starts to come into her own and blossom as a dancer. She even ends up having an affair with the self-centered and womanizing Yuri (Mikhail Baryshnikov), one of the stars of the company. Emilia and Emma start to grow close, with Emma treating Emilia like her own daughter. DeeDee finds herself growing jealous of both her daughter and her former best friend.

Needless to say, it all leads to Emma throwing a drink in DeeDee’s face and the two of them having a cat fight on the streets of New York…

The Turning Point is no Black Swan or Red Shoes. Leslie Browne (who was playing a character based on herself) was a great dancer but not much of an actress so you never care about her the way that you do Natalie Portman in Black Swan. The dancers are amazing in both films but Darren Aronofsky literally put the audience in Portman’s ballet slippers while Herbert Ross keeps the audience at a distance, allowing them to watch and appreciate the dancers’s passion but not necessarily to experience it with them.

But, with all that in mind, I still enjoyed The Turning Point. What can I say? I love dance movies! Both Shirley MacClaine and Anne Bancroft give excellent performances. Bancroft apparently had no dance experience before shooting The Turning Point (and it’s hard not to notice that, whenever Emma is performing, the camera focuses on those moving around her as opposed to Emma herself) but she still does a good job of poignantly capturing Emma’s fear of getting older and her joy when she realizes that Emilia looks up to her. MacClaine, meanwhile, has an amazing scene where she watches her screen daughter perform and, in just a matter of seconds, we watch as every emotion — pride, envy, regret, and finally happiness — flashes across her face.

And, of course, there’s that cat fight. It’s a silly scene, to be honest. But seriously, if there was any actress who could convincingly throw a drink in someone else’s face, it was Anne Bancroft.

The Turning Point was nominated for 11 Oscars and it ended up setting a somewhat dubious record when it managed to win exactly zero. (This perhaps shouldn’t be surprising when you consider its competition included Annie Hall and the first Star Wars.)

Well — no matter!

Though the film may not be perfect, I liked it!

International Weirdness : “The Presence” (A.K.A. “Die Prasenz”)

Posted on July 10, 2016 by Ryan C. (fourcolorapocalypse)

Trash Film Guru

When it comes to the “found footage” horror genre, there’s really not much you can realistically ask for at this point, is there? 15 years into the ever-dimming past, “scare me” seemed a reasonable enough request; a decade back, “show me something new” would have sufficed; five years ago, most of us were willing to settle for “at least do what you’re gonna do well.”

Today? Shit, I dunno — speaking personally, I’d say that I’ve been worn down to the point where “just don’t bore me to death” will do the trick. So when something like 2015’s ultra-cheap German “shaky-cam” flick Die Prasenz (or, as you’ll see it listed on Netflix right now should you care to look for it, The Presence — oh, and it’s most likely also available on Blu-ray or DVD depending on which part of the globe you call home) comes along and actually proves…

View original post 484 more words

Cleaning Out The DVR, Again #27: Running For Her Life (dir by Philippe Gagnon)

Posted on July 10, 2016 by Lisa Marie Bowman

(Lisa is currently in the process of trying to clean out her DVR by watching and reviewing all 40 of the movies that she recorded from the start of March to the end of June. She’s trying to get it all done by July 11th! Will she make it!? Keep visiting the site to find out!)

The 27th film on my DVR was Running For Life, which originally aired on Lifetime on May 29th.

Running For Her Life has a very simple and yet very important message: if you’re going to take part in hypnotherapy, make sure that your therapist isn’t a fucking psycho who is obsessed with you. Really, that seems like it should be common sense but I’ve seen enough Lifetime films to know that people of a certain age and socio-economic background are often way too quick to enter into co-dependent relationships with people that they barely know!

For instance, Alison Wynn (Claire Forlani) wants to be an Olympic-winning triathlete, despite the fact that she’s still recovering from a major accident, one that caused many doctors to tell her that she would never walk again. Alison proved them wrong then and she wants to prove them wrong now! The only problem is that something is holding her back from giving it her all in competition. Could it be a childhood trauma of some sort? Could it be her own insecurity over her husband’s attractive new assistant?

What better way to find out than to convince the famous and controversial Dr. Laura Stevens (Michelle Nolden) to take her on as a client! At first, Laura says that she only works with professional athletes and suggests that Alison just read her book. But Alison continues to beg and eventually, Laura relents.

It turns out that Laura is a demanding coach. She pushes Alison to the limit and then demands even more, all the while screaming at her that her mother was right and that Alison is worthless. But, despite the harsh treatment, Alison starts to get better. It especially helps when Laura hyponotizes her and implant psychic suggestions in her brain. Of course, there is a nosy reporter (Arnold Pinnock) who claims that Laura is less of a coach and more of a brainwasher but at least Laura is getting results!

Of course, that’s not all Laura is doing. It quickly becomes apparent that she has grown obsessed with Alison. Soon, Laura is breaking into Alison’s apartment and hiding panties behind the cushions of the living room couch. “THESE AREN’T MINE!” Alison later yells at her husband.

It all leads to a scene in which Alison’s husband confronts Laura and Laura literally smashes a bottle over her head. Seriously, it’s one of the most batshit crazy scenes to ever show up in a Lifetime film and it makes the entire film required viewing.

Anyway, I rather liked Running For Her Life. Yes, it’s predictable but it’s also fun. As well, this is one of the rare Lifetime films where the victims are just as interesting as villains. Claire Forlani really throws herself into the role of Alison and you actually find yourself hoping that things actually do work out for her (though I have to admit that I’m still not totally sure I understand what a triathlon is). Meanwhile, Michelle Nolden turns Dr. Laura into a truly classic Lifetime villain.

Keep an eye out for Running For Her Life!